Married to Science
by Mr. Skiperdoo
Summary: Aperture Science's new project is the most ambitious undertaking since the creation of the quantum tunnels, but what happens when their immediate plans to go to the moon turn out to be dangerous?
1. Chapter 1

Author's Note: **Before I begin, NO! This isn't in script format, instead its just an artistic form of… I'm getting ahead of myself FORGET WHAT I JUST SAID! You want a story like this? FINE! Please don't get horribly confused during the first part because it's just a measly prologue. Read and Review because reviewing makes me feel all giggly inside and helps me to believe there are real people in the world who don't think I'm a total loser. No, I don't know anyone who thinks that either, but who cares?**

All Instances presented in this story are completely fictitious. None of them are based in reality. No, I am not a government conspiracy theorist.

~X~X~X~X~X~

PROLOGUE

_On October 4__th__, 1957, the USSR successfully launched the first artificial satellite into space; further igniting the scientific push to place a man into the vast unknowns of space. At around the same time, Aperture Science had developed a successful prototype for a handheld portal device, weighing with the full vacuum accelerator at around 21kg. Less than three years later, the USSR again surpassed expectations by launching the first human in orbit. _

_After this, President Kennedy made it a top priority for the United States to put a man on the moon by the end of the decade. Government funding for scientific companies such as Black Mesa and Aperture Science were greatly increased during this time, and in 1969, the world was stunned when they saw two men climb out of their lunar lander and onto the moon. The official government statements told the public that Lance Armstrong was indeed the first person to walk on the moon; however, the truth was best kept secret by those who feared what it would evidently lead to. _

_Aperture Science decided to capitalize on this opportunity by hybridizing their quantum tunneling project with the space race. The first test went extremely well; the handheld portal device turned out to be stable when presented with the vacuum of the moon. The second test… turned out to be a little less than satisfactory._

_It wasn't until 40 years later that the real truth was revealed, when the world was plunged into chaos from otherworldly influences. This is the leaked transcript from a 1960's conversation taken directly from the president's phone._

BEGIN TRANSCRIPT

MORETTA: Good morning Mr. President.

JOHNSON: David Moretta, NASA's top liaison official. What can I do for you?

MORETTA: President Johnson, you know that I'm in charge of dictating which… very sensitive information is released to the public, correct?

JOHNSON: Yes, I'm well aware of that…

MORETTA: Good, because this issue deals directly with one of DARPA's closely observed private administrations, which is in this case Aperture Science.

JOHNSON: Aperture Science. Where have I heard that name?

MORETTA: Most likely in official statements made by the Pentagon, or half of the bureaucratic backroom deals involving the worlds "top physicists".

JOHNSON: I see. So then what's the real issue here?

MORETTA: Aperture Science has been investigated many times before by a number of executive agencies including NASA. But recently, Aperture Science is believed to be involved in the mysterious disappearance of three astronauts. I've already contacted the CIA about this, but I don't want the public to get involved. The worst thing that can happen is to bring the people into this.

JOHNSON: So what are you suggesting?

MORETTA: Mr. President, with your permission of course, I'd like to make this a class B case.

JOHNSON: An interesting proposition; do you think we should leave this alone until we have more information?

MORETTA: No… but in the end that's not my decision.

JOHNSON: Very well then. Keep it at class A until our friends at the CIA reply back to us, understood?

MORETTA: Yes Mr. President… understood.

JOHNSON: Good, then its done.

MORETTA: Yes Mr. President…

END TRANSCRIPT

~X~X~X~X~X~

Caroline smiled as she reached to touch her newfound joy. "Isn't it so cute?" She said, looking up to Cave for a response.

"Well I can't argue with you there. It has been scientifically proven to be downright adorable." Cave casually replied. "Although I don't know what everyone else will think when they see the bill."

Not satisfied by the underwhelming response, Caroline tightened her grip on the small bundle in her arms. She moved closer to Cave to expect his strangely placed motives. "This is your creation after all. You should be so proud, yet you don't even act like this is a big deal."

"Trust me, I know how big a deal this is. And technically it's only half of my creation." He said with a wink in his eye.

"That doesn't mean it's any less extraordinary!"

"You're right… it doesn't." Cave paced around Caroline, eyeing the precious entity. "And at the same time, we must remember there's still a lot of work to do… especially with more immediate matters."

Caroline's face grew worried, but then retained its calm complexion once she thought about it deeper. "As much as I'm afraid to say it…" She said with a disappointed gaze. "I have to say you're right."

"Caroline, lay the handheld portal device on the desk, it seems to be weighing you down a bit."

Caroline placed the device onto the desk as ordered.

"You should try handling one of the real bad boys instead of one of those miniature models." Cave said as he retreated into his desk chair. "Now how much was our funding been increased by the Department of Defense since last month?"

Caroline was shocked at how quick Cave had just changed the subject. "Well uh, let me look at the reports here…" She took out a couple of number ridden files. "Sir… Mr. Johns… Cave…" She stuttered. "As long as we keep promoting contracts, Aperture's likely to see a 7% increase in funding."

"Good, and what about Black Mesa?"

Caroline's mouth tightened. "What… about Black Mesa?"

"You know… have they made anything big? Moneywise?"

"Well uh… um…" Caroline looked back at the reports. "I wouldn't know… but I would logically guess that they've seen an increase in funding but… I don't… see anything…"

"Those are public reports. They've released the financial report for the last few years, I wouldn't expect them to suddenly classify the information on Black Mesa."

Caroline shuffled through the stack once more. She remembered seeing the name 'Black Mesa' once or twice throughout, but she was focused on finding Aperture so something like that wouldn't matter. Besides, Cave usually got angry whenever he saw those reports. It wasn't that he wasn't satisfied with Aperture's performance, but that he believed that the primary reason behind Black Mesa's success was because they'd steal from the real scientists at Aperture.

Then, in an instant, Caroline's eyes widened. She looked to Cave and back at the reports a couple times. Cave knew this meant she was holding something back.

"Caroline…" Cave's hand was open, ready to receive the reports no matter how bleak they looked.

"What?"

"Caroline… hand me the paper." Cave insisted.

Caroline bit her lip. She avoided eye contact with Cave as she handed him the paper.

Cave received the report and began to read silently. "Hmm…" he murmured, passing all the useless grant information. He seemed pretty nonchalant until his eyes reached the bottom of the page. "My God." He said, his mind delivering an instinctively intense reaction at the sight of the numbers.

"How could this be?" He asked, looking up at Caroline to see if it were some sick joke.

Caroline hid her face from Cave.

Cave put the paper face down onto the desk. "Well, Caroline." He began, raising his eyebrows in the process, "how do you think this happened?"

Caroline looked back at Cave not with a frown, but with a smile. "I believe it began with a young shower curtain engineer and his entrepreneurial expertise."

"Ha, ha, ha!" Cave heartily laughed as he arose from his chair to unexpectedly hug Caroline. "We did it! We outperformed Black Mesa!" He yelled, signaling a confidant reaction.

Caroline smiled at the rare show of affection.

"We must celebrate… but how?"

Caroline looked back at him confused. "You mean you weren't planning anything beforehand?"

"Well no. The good news came as quite a shock to me."

The two stared at each other awkwardly for a few seconds, until Caroline won the battle when Cave decided to continue speaking.

"Well if you weren't planning anything…" Caroline turned around and headed for the office door.

"No, WAIT!"

Caroline grinned as her feet came to a sudden stop.

"There was this umm… there was this…" Cave nervously scanned his mind for a way out of the strange ordeal. "There uh…"

"Go on." Caroline nodded.

"I… maybe was thinking, no suggesting… that we uhh… perhaps should…"

"Should…"

"MANNY'S! GO there I mean… to uh… eat. Because that's what people do at Manny's… I think." Cave was sweating so hard he felt like taking a shower would dry him a little. It was all because he was as nervous as a paralyzed grasshopper watching an slowly approaching horde of ants.

Caroline giggled. "For dinner? And miss out on Aperture Science nutrition gel?" she joked.

"A tough decision, but one that has to be made." Cave remarked.

"So… tonight at 6:30?" Caroline suggested.

"Uhh… yeah… 18:30."

Caroline saluted to Cave as she walked off, leaving the man alone in his office.

'_I guess that went well…_' he subconsciously told himself.

A few minutes of silence was all that Cave needed to fully engage himself in his own emotions. In almost fifteen years since he'd known Caroline, he'd never gotten very far into their relationship. Sure they'd chat with each other and joke around, but nothing serious really came between them. But now they were finally going somewhere. Maybe this would eventually lead to something big.

All was going well. He'd just succeeded in finding an excuse to take a break from the chaotic environment at Aperture. At least that's what Cave thought until the lights immediately shut off, leaving him in total darkness.

"Damn!"

~X~X~X~X~X~

"What the hell are they doing down at the reactor core?" A man yelled as he flipped the switch on one of his flashlights.

"I don't know, but they better get the backup started immediately." Another man replied.

"Call them and tell them to hurry up."

"Uh sir… I can't do that…"

"Why not Chris?"

"Because the power's out." The man named Chris answered.

"Damn." The main cursed as he slammed the wall with his fist. "Well I guess since we're so close to the reactor we should go check what they've done with the damn thing."

Chris silently nodded and the two walked off into the dark corridors of manufacturing. It felt like another world in complete darkness. The bright reflections of cubes were replaces by haunting reminiscent shadows, the conveyer belts conveyed themselves in a ghoulish way, and the thick overhead pipes of steel acted as a looming proportion to the rooms whenever flashed with light.

"Ooh, dark down here isn't it?"

"Well… yeah."

"They say the old administrator of this place went absolutely crazy. Chopped up his entire staff." The man said, waving his flashlight at all corners of the room.

"Come on, you're just trying to scare me."

"They say at night you can still hear the screams."

"That's just you receiving your paycheck at night." Chris said, shaking his head at his friend. "And who's this 'they' you speak of?"

"The dead workers of course. At night, they stay in the same rooms they were in when they were murdered. There they scream for help… but no one comes for them."

A strange sound came from down the hallway. At first Chris thought it was just his imagination thinking out loud. It was hard to make out, but he actually hear soft yells of help coming from all around.

Chris stopped in his tracks. "You hear that?" He asked, noting the voices that were oddly enough calling for him.

"Hear what?"

"Those voices… Nathan, I really hear someone calling for help."

Nathan shook his head and smiled. "Chris C'mon, even I'll admit the story wasn't that good." He said, his face turning more serious as he saw his friend's.

"Over here, I hear him!" Chris ran over to door that was closed tightly.

"Help!"

"We're coming!" Nathan yelled as the two fiddled to get the door open.

In seconds the wooden door gave way, and the two found themselves in the backup generator's room. On the floor was an employee lying on his back injured.

"Chris, you take care of turning the backup on." Said Nathan. "I'll see how our friends doing."

The man on the floor grabbed his leg tightly. "Ahh… I was walking on the second floor catwalk… when the power came off. I was surprised enough that I slipped and fell." He leaned forward to hold his leg even tighter. "Urghh, I think I may have broken it."

Nathan looked around the room. "Is the equipment all right?"

"Yeah, my leg's the only thing here that's broken."

Nathan gave a sigh of relief. "Good, I'd have a lot of explaining to do if any expensive equipment was broken."

Within the time span of two minutes, Chris had activated the backup generators systems. The whole facility took time to re-adjust to the change.

"Finally, the lights are back on."

"Yeah, no s*#!." Chris remarked as he climbed out of the activation panel.

"What the hell made the generator go off like that?" Nathan asked as he tended to the wounded man.

"It's those damn super-particle tests they've been running that makes the reactor overload and automatically shut off. That's why we don't put the facility in charge of idiots; they'd destroy the facility!"

"Right…" Chris commented as he walked towards a red telephone and picked it up. "Hello? Yeah, put me in with the engineering department… you what? No automatic generator systems? Yeah, he couldn't get to the generator due to… physical constraint."

"Chris, how should we help him?" Nathan asked.

"Take him to the infirmary… and don't let any mention of worker's compensation reach Cave."

"Wha- what?"

"Enough. There will be no mention of work related accidents, understand? Cave's had enough with these accidents."

The man looked up at them as if he'd lost an important battle. With a submissive gesture, he nodded and the two helped him off his feet.

~X~X~X~X~X~

Cave straightened his suit for the 73rd time. He quickly paced down the sidewalk nearest to the locally acclaimed restaurant. Checking his watch, he beat back thoughts of having the establishment packed so full that no one could get in.

He'd never been to Manny's himself. Instead, he'd only seen and heard about it from other people at Aperture. The general consensus was that they'd go there to celebrate a new breakthrough or discovery. However, Cave rarely ever dined out; and even then it was very uncommon for him to do it with anyone else.

"6:34." He read. "If it weren't for those incompetent employees I'd be sitting down by now." He rounded the corner in hopes of seeing Caroline waiting for him at the entrance of the restaurant, but instead he was met with the fear which he'd previously thought up. The restaurant looked packed, at least in Cave's eyes.

Now if he could only find Caroline…

"Mr. Johnson?"

Cave looked to see Caroline calling for him. She was exiting the building, and by the looks of it, she had good news.

"Cave, I already got us a seat, where have you been?" She asked as she met up with the man's pace.

"I was a bit caught up with the generator problem. I tell you when those scientists go crazy it could cause a disaster to the facility." He said as the two entered the wooden doors to Manny's restaurant.

It was your normal setup. A bar resided in the middle with table density becoming less prominent the further out it was. The light outside was beginning to diminish, so the overhead lamps would cast soft light onto the individual tables.

"Our seats are over here." Caroline said as she pointed to a small seating are at the less populated edge of the restaurant. Cave squeezed through a couple of people who looked like they were standing around with their mouths open drooling on the floor.

Once they took a seat, they both picked up their menus and began the search for something edible.

"So uh… what do you think about next week's big project?" Cave asked with a smile.

"Oh, you mean the…" Caroline looked around the restaurant, suspicious that someone was listening in. "the moon project?"

Cave lowered his menu. "No, the other multi-billion dollar undertaking." Cave casually joked.

"Well since the last one went so well, I'm sure nothing can go wrong this time." Caroline said with an equally re-assuring smile. "We've taken even more precautions than last time, in comparison; we were running it pretty loose back then. We've also been successful in er… inflating the project's financial requirements."

"And as long as we have the bureaucracies on our side, we're never going to run out of taxpayer dollars."

Caroline laughed at Cave's remark. "Oh Mr. Johnson, you've always known how to look on the bright side." She said, still retaining the memories of Cave's negative reaction to almost anything with Black Mesa.

"True, but what other side is there to look at?"

Caroline laughed once more. "If your eyes emit light, you can never see the dark side of things."

"Unless of course none of the light is reflected back to the viewer..." Cave returned.

"Or if you're wearing sunglasses."

"Or if the reflecting surface constitutes an angular range which folds in on itself through a linearly placed pattern of photon capturing structures which act as a beam transmitter that shows the unlit outer edges."

Caroline broke up at Cave's words. "Or that…"

Cave laid his hands on the table and looked out the window. "Caroline… have you thought about what you're going to do in… the future?" He asked it as a question, but delivered it like a statement.

Caroline bit her lip. "Well I guess I'm going to be working with Aperture until we successfully create an anti-aging machine."

"And what if we don't?"

"What do you mean?"

"I mean we're not going to stay young forever."

"True, but I do see an youth pills somewhere in the future."

Cave looked disappointed. "I see… do we have any updates on one of our nuclear projects?"

"Oh yes well… there was this advancement with the antiparticles being shot through a dense electron field." Caroline admitted.

"And how did that go?"

"Well… now we know what not to do when experimenting with possible antimatter fluctuations."

"I see." Cave said as he checked out the frustratingly small beverage section of the menu. "So what's new with the caustic grenades? You know, the ones that would stick to enemies skin and slowly-"

"Oh those… heh, well they were… sort of banned."

"Banned?" Cave's eyes grew larger. "Banned by who? The U.S. Army?"

Caroline solemnly nodded.

"Damn, that would've helped our boys beat back the Cong." Cave gave another hearty laugh.

"Oh stop your chortling." Caroline said with the wave of her hand. "You and I both know that by the end of the year that mess will be over." Caroline then saw a cheery waitress approaching them, notebook in hand. "Ooh, I think it's time for us to order." She said, bouncing in her seat.

"And what may I get to start you two off tonight?" The waitress asked, taking out a pen. "We have an assortment of beverages ranging from alcoholic to non-alcoholic."

"I'll have the lemonade." Cave told the waitress.

"Just water…" Caroline sternly answered.

"Ok, and have you two decided on what you're gonna eat?"

"Let's see," Cave said as he scanned the menu once more. "you got anything that won't uh… Caroline?"

The waitress changed her focus to Caroline.

"Mm… I'll have the steak and potatoes with the grand salad deluxe… and with a bit of negative clutter on the side..."

The waitress looked at her confused. "E- excuse m-"

"BREAD AND Butter… I meant bread… and butter." Caroline put on a fake smile as both she and the waitress turned towards Cave.

"Uh yes I'll have the… omelet." He said as he closed the menu.

"Uh sir… I'm afraid we don't serve omelets." The waitress answered politely.

"You don't?" Cave said, moving his tongue around in his mouth. "Well why not?"

"I'm sorry sir, but it's not on the menu." The woman said again in a very polite manner.

"So what if it's not on the menu?" Cave critiqued, ushering in what Caroline knew was going to be pre-recorded message material. "If the world was only able to experiment with 'what's on the menu', there wouldn't be a Manny's restaurant!"

"Cave…" Caroline tried to suppress Cave's urge to inflate the topic.

"You got eggs? Steak? Onions, olives, peppers? An oven that can reach 425 degrees Kelvin?" He asked the waiter in a direct manner.

"Well… yes, but…" The waitress backed off a couple steps as she learned there was nothing she could say to the man that was professional and negative at the same time.

"Two words: Flip it."

"Mr. Johnson…"

"Sir, the cooks are trained to only make certain orders, they can't-"

"What? Use their brains?" Cave interrupted. "Sounds about right from the looks of them."

"N-no its just."

"Oh I see, you're too tied up in all the red tape to move outside the norm and do something different! Well I'll tell you this; without a complete disregard for that ideology, Aperture Science would never have moved past making shower curtains for military scumbags working for Black Mesa!"

"Mr. Johnson!" Caroline looked around her to see everyone's eyes focused on the strange commotion.

Now it was on. Cave had reached the point of no return, and Caroline knew this meant he wasn't going to stop anytime soon. All she could do was accept the fact that Cave was being a bit eccentric and enjoy the ride that came with it.

"I demand to see the manager!" Cave exclaimed.

"Cave!"

"Here I am!" A man said as he exited the bar during the confrontation.

"Good, now we can talk business!" Cave muttered as he argued with the manager.

"Oh dear…" Caroline muttered as she followed Cave four steps behind and two the right, just like normal.

~X~X~X~X~X~

Author's notes: **You got this far down? SOMEONE CARES!**


	2. Problem?

Author's notes: **I love inventing words. Tiglixtimaxt. See, that was a word you say when you have nothing good to add to one of your stories. I invented it yesterday; so far it's not in the dictionary. But after I contact Oxford or whoever's in charge of it, I'm sure it will be a household saying by the end of August.**

**So, there you go… tiglixtimaxt.**

~X~X~X~X~X~

Caroline moved her ear up towards the door to Mr. Johnson's office. He'd been arguing with that scientist for over an hour now, debating the possible repercussions of what he called 'part 2'. Most of the debate had been shrouded in secrecy, but Caroline did overhear some of the lab boys talking about the moon trip amongst their colleagues.

"I'm telling you, you have no idea what we're getting into!" The scientist yelled in a previously unreached height of aggressiveness. "If this goes wrong, it could change the world as we know it!"

"It'll change the world if it goes right as well." Cave retorted.

"No it…" The scientist stumbled in frustration. "We already succeeded once, we should wait until the technology is suitable to conduct it once more in an even safer enviro-"

"Enough!" Cave yelled raising his hand as a sign of power. "Dr. Muller, if you don't stop this… fear of advancement, I'm afraid I'm gonna have to fire you." He said, not clear on whether he truly meant it to the fullest extent.

"Fire me? But without me, Aperture wouldn't even have a space venture!"

"Cave grabbed his chin. "You're right… well then I'll have to dock your pay."

"Damnit!" Dr Muller yelled as he trudged out of the CEO office.

"Until we finish the project."

Dr. Muller furiously swung the door open. His expression changed however, when he noticed the innocent looking Caroline standing behind with her signature clipboard in hand. "Oh, good morning Ms. McClain." He said with a painfully obvious wooden smile on his face. He inconspicuously neared her ear to whisper. "He's in one of those moods again."

"Noted." Caroline said as the awkward encounter was broken with Dr. Muller's departure. Caroline took a deep breath before approaching her boss. She knew when Cave got into these moods it was difficult to get him out, especially when it involved Black Mesa. However, she knew this didn't involve Black Mesa in the slightest. Instead it had to do with their biggest and most recent project. The one Cave secretly dubbed "Portal Me to the Moon".

"What about that Armstrong guy? Did he return our calls?" Cave asked as he shifted through a list of renowned astronauts. Caroline regained her train of thought and headed over to the eagerly waiting man.

"No, but we were able to contact a few more who volunteered for the job." Caroline answered. "Even after last week's success, Mr. Svelstrisk says he's not ready to have another go at it."

"Shame, sending people to the moon by portal is an excellent opportunity. I'm surprised he left so quickly, especially considering how excited he was." Cave retorted, missing the notion that being 'excited' in his view could mean 'out of their mind, freaked out, unprepared, first day of school nervous' to someone else.

Cave exchanged papers with his assistant. "You sure all this is all confidential?"

Caroline nodded. "Don't you worry, there's only one outside of Aperture who know about this."

"And that person being…"

"Atlas…" Caroline answered with a withdrawn smile. 

"Atlas?" Cave asked with a similar expression.

Caroline nodded as she still tried to hold back her smile. "Miniscule probabilities aside, it's entirely unlikely and theoretically impossible your cat could be a communist spy."

"I don't know," Caroline wondered, resting her hands upon her hip. "I did see him exchanging nip along with a couple of obscurely sized notes with the strays down the street a while ago…"

"Right." Cave said as he examined the project's statistical data. "Damnit!" He yelled as he shuffled through the bunch, throwing down the ones which didn't give the next test a green light. He ended up with only one paper, the one which stated in great detail how the quantum tunneling device would not scare the astronaut off due to its new design.

"What is it Mr. Johnson?" Caroline asked, noticing that she changed the formality of his name to fit the situation once more.

"Oh nothing… just the lingering probability that if this goes wrong it could create a world sucking black hole."

"What?"

"But don't worry, Dr. Muller already lectured me on the chances. In fact, we're more likely to form a resonance cascade creating an inter-dimensional split which leads to aliens and monsters from other worlds to flood the facility and eventually take control of the whole Earth under the direct liaison of an official from Black Mesa!"

"Oh, Mr. Johnson, you always have the best jokes."

"Yep, but you're the best when it comes to limerick fights…" He said, raising his eyebrow.

"Maybe I am… you up for a round?" She asked, already prepping her mind with complex structures of the English language. 

"Sure, you go first…"

"Alright then…" Caroline mind performed push-ups as she looked for the perfect words.

"There once was a singularity collapsing still… and every diffeomorphism would make it ill… its manifold grew weak… for it took seventy weeks… for its favorite covariance to be on the grill!"

"Tough act to follow…" Cave commented, leaning back into his chair. He knew Caroline had at least ten more of those ready to deploy. He figured since they were just casually talking, he'd give it his best shot.

"There once was an exponential decay, with fields of magnets and a particle ray. Its charge grew dim, and density slim… uh…" He began to sweat… "And it made a hippopotamus gay."

"Hey! That last one had ten syllables!"

"No it didn't!" Cave said as he counted with his fingers. "7…8…"

"Mr. Johnson, admit that I'm the best." Caroline's words and tone reminded Cave of the scientist he found fresh out of college. Even though she was about thirty, she looked as if she hadn't aged a day since then. It was almost as if she really did have some anti-aging pills and was keeping it from Cave.

"9…" Cave let his fingers fall to his desk. "Yeah, I guess you're right. But I do wonder if the particle fields would be able to change a hippopotamus's mood…"

"You do? Because I could get the lab boys to…"

"No no Caroline, that's fine." Cave said, not knowing whether or not it was actually a good idea. "We have enough to worry about with Portal Me to the Moon."

Previously headed for the door, Caroline returned to Cave's side. "I guess you're right." She said, putting her hand up on the chair and leaning down towards Cave's ear. "But after we start colonizing Mercury, we study the electrochemical beneficiary habits of the _Hippopotamus amphibious, deal?_"

Cave smiled at Caroline's foresight. "Deal." He said as he patted her hand. As he looked at her hand, he noticed her watch already said 5:34. Another glance at the wall clock affirmed his assumption.

Everything was going along smoothly. If this next week would just go according to plan, Aperture would be a household name by the end of the decade. They'd be the leaders in extra-terrestrial real estate, selling their dome houses for only two-million a month. When he was tired of all the strong gravity, he'd just slide a panel and walk onto the moon. He could imagine him and Caroline, watching the sun as it rose above the earth, having the only thing separating him from the emptiness of the moon being 12 feet of molecular sealed Plexiglas.

But then there was the problem with the meteorites…

Maybe later…

"Cave…" Caroline neared her boss's head even closer until her nose was almost touching his ear.

"Uh… yes Caroline?"

"Can I ask you something?"

Cave's mind was assaulted with a plethora of possible outcomes to each branching conversations. He knew where this was going. "Of course." He said, ready for Caroline to make the next move in this extended rules version of chess.

"Why have you been wearing that same tie for the past two weeks?"

"Oh well um… it's my lucky tie…" Cave said, adjusting his accessory so it was perfectly symmetrical.

"So you were expecting to get lucky these past weeks?" Caroline said, backing off the side and now standing in front of her boss. It was strange to see Caroline this way, for she usually was acting in a fully professional manner. However, there was a sort of "cool off" time where Cave was in the best of moods after a long developed project had been finished or a checklist filled. At the moment, Caroline knew that even now there was still much to be done.

"I already have gotten lucky." Cave said with another smile. "First of all, I've witnessed and even co-ordinated the first time man has ever gotten the chance to walk on the moon." He looked up to meet Caroline's eyes. "And frankly, I have my lovely assistant to be with me when there's a… shortage of advancements."

"Shortage of advancements?" Caroline asked. "Mr. Johnson, please." Caroline then did the unexpected. Without warning she lunged onto Cave and gave him the biggest kiss he'd been given in months. It wasn't just a casual peck on the check; it was full on lip-to-lip. Cave's eyes widened at the surprise, and after a few seconds, his eyes simply closed to embrace the darkness. When his eyes opened again, the light was still gone.

He closed his eyes and opened them again. Still dark.

"It must be the generator acting up again." Caroline said, pulling back to speak.

"Should we go-"

"No." Caroline said, as she shut her boss up in more ways than one.

~X~X~X~X~X~

Chris lurched forward as he reached to open the sealed door. "Not again." He said to himself as he worked on the door with the sole visual aid of his flashlight. Finally the metal door opened up into the large reactor room.

"Hello? Anyone in here?" He yelled into the darkened void. He flipped on one of the nearby emergency lights and started to look for a way to turn the generator back on. Starting the behemoth was no easy task; it usually required a few people just to man the switch, but with a highly trained nuclear engineer, it could be done in a jiffy.

"Ah… my arm…"

Chris looked over to the bottom of a large scaffolding to see the same employee who was injured last time grasping his arm. Chris ran over to the sobbing wimp of an engineer. "First your leg and now your arm? I guess you have to compensate for the permanent defect in your head."

"Just help me up will you?" Chris helped the man up to his feet, even though the real pain was in his arm. "Where's your incompetent friend at?"

"Oh Nathan? He went to the restroom just before the lights were cut. I wonder if it'll disrupt his aim…"

"Too much information!"

"So in short, he might take a while."

"Whatever, just… just start messing with the chamber controls." The employee said, pointing to a sealed metal door encasing a room full of nuclear storage materials.

"Wait… don't you need to wear a ha…"

"Yeah, you'll need to wear a chem suit. And if anything goes wrong you have to go in there." The employee pointed towards another room. This one was a simple square enclosure with a couple pipes coming out of the wall, a shower head, a few barrels containing something unknown, and a glass window for observation.

Chris nervously followed up his confirming gaze with a worried question. "And what do they do there?"

"That's where they strip you down and tirelessly scrub every last inch of your naked body to clean the radiation off."

Chris cringed. "And I have to…" he pointed towards the control chamber. "Go in there?"

"Not until we get the backup power working. But once that's done, it's your duty to take one for the team."

Chris waved his flashlight to the backup controls. He began to fiddle with it very carefully to make sure he didn't do something horrible to the entire facility. "What happened here anyways."

The employee sat down besides the backup controls and stretched his legs out in front of him. "Its those damn hyper-conductors. They suck up power like a leech." He said, looking at his arm as he held it even tighter. "I tell you, one day some experiment with them in it's going to go horribly wrong."

Chris managed to restore the temporary power fix to the facility. The lights came back on, albeit on their low power save setting. "There…" he said, closing the two by two panel. "Now let's see about your arm."

"I think I broke it… but I wouldn't know since my leg turned out to be fine after a couple of days."

"Did you fall down on it?"

"Yeah, just like last time. When the generator began to overload I ran to see what was going on. However, the lights went off just as I was rounding the corner… tripping was only a matter of chance at that point."

Chris helped the injured man up to his feet. "Alright, let's go find Nathan before we start the repai-"

Just as Chris was about to head for the door, Nathan burst into the room.

"Chris chris!" He yelled with disgruntled look on his face. "Whatever you do, don't approach fifty feet from the bathroom for the next few hours."

~X~X~X~X~X~

Caroline stepped out of her home and onto the large green lawn. She could see all around cars bustling, people greeting, and birds singing to the nitrogen rich air. There was a faint but recognizable sound of Bob Crosby playing in the background. It was a mid-day event, with a lot of people running to a center alcove to see something intriguing at the nearby pavilion. Curious, Caroline decided to see what was going on; so she walked down the creaky steps and further onto her lawn.

"What a beautiful day!" She said to herself as she trotted along the sidewalk.

Upon further investigation, she noticed that the thing everybody had been drawn to was a strange glowing object less than a foot in diameter floating unsupported at chest level above the pavilion floor. Next to the glowing object was a goggled man holding up what seemed to be some sort of remote controlling device.

The crowd oohed and aahed at the spectacular presentation. At the press of a button, the ball would expand, contract, and even change colors. The onlookers then gave delightful claps as they watched the glowing sun like sphere continue through its amazing cycle.

As Caroline moved closer to the white pavilion, she noticed something even more interesting. The man holding the remote was none other than Cave Johnson!

"Why good afternoon Caroline!" Cave said as he took off his circular goggles. With a turning of a knob, the glowing object faded until it was just a solid black blob. Cave grabbed the blob, compressed it, and put it into his pocket which made the crowd deliver yet another round of basking.

"Good afternoon to you too Mr. Johnson!" Caroline replied. She was a little taken aback when she noticed Cave's confused expression. Cave slowly walked off the pavilion and the crowd began to disperse.

"Mr. Johnson?" He asked to himself. "You don't need to be so formal."

Caroline smiled as she watched little children from the crowd acting out the sight they'd just seen to their friends. "What were you doing out here?" She asked. "And what was that?"

Cave took the solid blob out from his pocket. "I was just showing the public some more of our newest project." He held the blob up to sun. "After all, with nuclear fusion technology readily available, they'll never have to worry about powering their homes ever again!"

"But Cave, I never remember working on a successful fusion project." Caroline said with a lingering haven of confusion breeding amongst the deepest recesses of her innermost mind. "When did we get this technology?"

"Caroline, you were the frontman… uh… woman for this project. You of all people should know!"

"But I could've sworn I…" Caroline looked down to the ground. There was still that strange feeling, a feeling of something so unnatural but at the same time so real. She couldn't comprehend it… and not being able to comprehend something was one of Caroline's least favorite points.

"Caroline? Are you feeling alright?" Cave asked. "Next you're going to forget about the moon colony."

"Moon colony?" Caroline was shocked by this information. "Cave, is this some elaborate prank?" She wondered. In all reality, Cave couldn't be serious. They hadn't even begun 'part 2', and already, Cave had gone through with 'part 17'. Could this really be happening? Had she somehow contracted sudden amnesia?

"Caroline, I've never been more serious." Cave answered, laying out his hands. "I think you need to relax bit, maybe we could go to Manny's for some ice cream."

Manny's? Maybe this was real. Maybe Caroline's mind had been caught up in some strange experiment which caused her recent memory to create upon itself a relapse continuum. At this point anything was possible.

"Manny's? I'd like that." Caroline noted.

"Excellent, let's take my car." Cave said as he walked towards Caroline's driveway.

"Wait… your car's in my driveway?"

"Those kids keep leaving their bicycles along the curb." Cave said, as he opened the driver side door. "Besides, I don't see the problem with parking back here."

Caroline wanted to provide an answer to the contrary, but for some reason, she didn't feel the need to. Some strange unseen force was holding her back, but she didn't know why and didn't have the initiative to figure out. Instead, she silently entered the car without a word.

"Are you sure you have enough gas?"

Cave took the black blob out of his pocket and shoved it under the dashboard.

"Enough to drive to Jupiter and back." Cave said blissfully. "Provided that the conditions on the theoretical roadway for the trip have the same conditions as here on Earth."

The hood of the car gave a quick glow and before Caroline knew it, the car had already begun driving with ease. "Cave this is amazing!" She exclaimed.

"I know." Cave answered. "Almost as amazing as something else I know." Cave turned to the side just enough to keep from being distracted.

The drive to Manny's was surprisingly short; in fact, it felt like two minutes on what usually was a fifteen minute drive. It was all a blur, almost as if Caroline was melting into time itself as it carried her along its flowing waves.

"I know it's usually a breach of protocol, but…" Cave looked towards his watch. "Ah, what the hell, it's almost five. I guess it won't be too distraught if he have a little dinner to go with our ice cream. He said as he grabbed Caroline's hand and led her into the restaurant.

'_At least Manny's hasn't changed a bit._" She thought to herself as she entered the fine establishment. The two quickly found a seat, and a couple of menus to go with it. It felt so strange for Caroline and Cave to be acting so casual. Usually they'd be talking about upcoming projects or recent financial reports, but Caroline couldn't even remember one. She couldn't even remember what happened yesterday, or the day before that. Come to think of it, she could barely remember what just happened. She was with Cave, he was at a pavilion, and she drove her to Manny's. But there was something missing…

"Ah, damnit, I forgot to contact Dr. Freeman on that anomalous materials study." Cave said as he took out and oddly looking device which was only a couple inches wide and at least five inches tall. The small black device looked very similar to a camera which would be used in one of those James Bond movies. "I guess I'll have to ask him about it now."

"What?"

After pressing a few buttons, Cave brought the strange device up to his ear. A few seconds later, he was talking with it in his hand as if it were a telephone. But as Caroline watched Cave talk more and more about the study, she soon realized that it was indeed a telephone! But not one that needed to be tied to a cord, but one that could easily fit in the palm of your hand, and go wherever you needed to go!

"Yeah fine, we'll have you in the pits tomorrow." Cave said as he moved the telephone away from his ear, pressed a button, and put it back into his pocket. "Now where were we." 

"What… was that?"

"Oh that? We're running a study on crystalline anomalous materials. It's really not that big of a deal so long as we stay safe."

"No I mean." Caroline's arms flailed around the table. "What… was that?" She said as she pointed towards Cave's pocket with her whole hand.

"That was Dr. Freeman. Promising scientist, but he doesn't talk much."

Caroline shook her head in disbelief. "Anomalous materials?" That sounds like something suited for Black Mesa."

"But it is suited for Black Mesa, that's why we're conducting it there." Cave said, noticing that Caroline's face was as confused as ever. *sigh* "Don't you remember? We own Black Mesa now. We bought it once we liberated Vietnam."

"What?" Caroline's slow trail to understanding was interrupted by a familiar waiter arriving at the table.

"Why don't you two look fine today?" The waiter said as he pulled out a notebook and a pen."What can I get you Mr. Johnson?" He asked with a joyous smile.

Cave looked at his menu and nodded with affirmation. "I'll just have the usual." He said, putting his menu down. He then gave Caroline a wink. 

Now knowing how to accept the awkward gesture Caroline gave her best poker face as the waiter then turned to her.

"And what will you have today Mrs. Johnson?"

'_THE F^#&?_' Mrs. Johnson? What was going on? This couldn't be real, could it? A million thoughts rushed through Caroline's head, all of them casting a negative light. Ten thousand emotions's engaged all at once, cancelling each other out in an empty gaze drawn out on her face.

Nervous as ever, Caroline knew she was beginning to show signs of increasing tension. Her skin became flushed, her pores began to ooze sweat, and her muscles tightened.

"I think I'll go to the restroom." She said as she got up from her chair. Awkward is this was, she couldn't help herself. It didn't feel like anything made an impact, it didn't feel like it made a difference, everything was in its place, but she didn't want to know where that place was.

She half expected Cave to yell for her to come back, but he stayed silent as she walked away. It was almost as if he was an actor who played out his allotted part and was now standing motionless as the camera began to center its lens to focus on only the actions of Caroline.

Caroline barged into the empty bathroom and immediately began to wash her eyes with the water. No matter how much she put on her face, it stayed dry. There was nothing she could do to change it. She looked up at the mirror to see her face getting only drier and drier. It began to lose its moisture, it became more and more wrinkled.

She struggled to put more water on her face to counter the sudden change, but it ended up to no effect. Try as she might she couldn't reverse the change. She looked deeper into the mirror and soon realized that she was now watching herself as she was aging through the years. It grew from a mid forties woman, to someone who was in her late fifties. But it was all Caroline.

Older and older, until she now had the frail complexion of someone who had lived their days to their fullest. She began to feel week as her bones crumbled under her. Before she could look in the mirror to see what came after. She felt a pounding on her stomach.

The pounding pushed her back. She almost lost balance.

Another pounding came, this one harder than the last.

Another one and another one, Caroline could hear what sounded like faint voices rising in clarity with each second. As Caroline was pushed back, the voice called to her: "Now… Now."

Caroline groaned as she felt the bathroom stall door fly open as she fell behind it. It closed in front of her, all by itself. It was no longer being guided by the universe's physical constraints, but it was being pushed by a growing blackness which was now engulfing the edges of Caroline's vision. Was she dying?

The blackness consumed all but the stall door in front of her; the floor gave way into a voided expanse. Once more, Caroline could hear the words calling…

"Now… Now…"

The stall door opened into the only light which was now visible. A bright white entry way which emanated a glowing bloom, reflecting off of nothing since everything else was so dark it was unable to reflect light. Caroline looked into the doorway. There was a man standing there. Was it Cave?

Caroline was unable to examine it more closely. The door slid closed, and now instead of being encumbered with light, Caroline was encumbered with the advancing sound… which kept coming.

"Now… NOW!" The demonic sounding voice yelled louder.

Caroline struggled to break free.

"NOW NOW!"

It was getting louder and louder!

"NOW NOW NOW!"

She couldn't get it out of her head!

"NOW NOW NOW!"

THE CAKE IS A LIE

"NOW NOW…"

"Meow… meow…" Atlas pawed Caroline's chest once more. She lifted her head to see the little black cat curling up beside her.

"Meow…"

"Oh it's you…" Caroline said as she lifted her hand to pet the adorable ball of fur. "You scared me there."

Atlas jumped off the bed and softly strode towards a nearby cabinet.

Caroline put her palm on her hand. She hadn't dreamed in weeks. Why the sudden change? It must've been those licorice sticks she had before she went to sleep. But there was another thing… she couldn't remember what the dream was about, or if it had any significant factors she could've determined.

She then recollected the one major thing remembered from her dream and analyzed it under a high powered microscope of thought. "Silly me…" She said to herself. "I don't have a green lawn."

Caroline turned the light on. "It's almost four…" She said, noticing the time on her bedside clock. "I better get ready for work."

"Meow…"

"After I feed my little communist spy…" She said as she opened the small cabinet. 

~X~X~X~X~X~

Author's notes:** Oo0Oo0Oo0OoH! Did a scare you? Well you probably are reading this in the middle of the night so you must be horrified. Don't bother going to bed, they're waiting for you there. Just… just find a nice spot on the floor or something. And those noises? Don't even bother; they won't go away no matter how hard you try. If you're not reading this in the middle of the night, then you'll have plenty of time to write a review!**

**Enjoy!**


	3. Portal Me to the Moon

"Careful with that camera Caroline… its one of the few pieces of equipment we can't spare to break at the moment." Cave's hand guided the placement of the heavy film-reel machine. "Be sure to uh… yes that's right the cap." He smiled as he watched Caroline finish the preparations.

"Mr. Johnson, if I may add, your pre-recorded messages are much… easier to handle." Caroline added, checking to see if she broke any sweat lifting the heavy object up onto its tripod.

"That may be true Caroline, but film carries with it much more prestige than just an auditory vibration. It forces the viewer to tremble in fear at the face of Aperture as it becomes the sole focus of their mind through some sort of manipulation."

"Oh Mr. Johnson, you always have the best ideas!" Caroline squealed as she grasped her hands together.

"I know, but that's not why you up here."

"Well then why did you call me up here Mr. Johnson?"

Cave got up from his seat. Caroline knew that whenever he'd walk over to the portrait of his father it was because he had inspiration pumping through his veins. The thought that he'd done so much for the (gated) scientific community in less than two decades would've made his father so proud of what he'd become. But then again, fifteen years was a long time ago, back when Caroline was just a young intern, and Cave was a bright entrepreneur.

"Caroline, five years ago, I came to a realization. Here on Earth, there are a lot of things we can discover, can create, but we're limited to what we can find in a much localized area. So, we need to expand our horizons, literally and figuratively."

"Oh Mr. Johnson, you've told me this story countless times." Caroline retorted.

"I… have?"

"Yes, remember the part about us establishing our very own mining facility on the moon?" Caroline didn't remember hearing it first hand, but she had a feeling she'd heard the story before; not from Cave but from herself.

"I… never told you that." Cave scratched his head, looking confused. "How'd you…"

"It was a lucky guess? I guess?"

"Hmm…" Cave returned to an open notebook on his desk. "Note: Next project we'll get Dr. Moritz to harness Caroline's uncanny mind reading abilities. Still a mystery if she has the power to implant them." He spoke the words out loud as he put them on paper.

"Oh, Mr. Johnson." Caroline waved her hand. "It came to me… in a dream. I usually have dreams with heavy amounts of science."

"I wish I dreamed about science." Cave said as he stared into space. "All I ever dream about is my toaster coming alive and eating me. Now, let's get to work on that camera, it's about time."

"Yes Mr. Johnson." Caroline listened to her boss and took the cap off of the camera. "It's almost ready…"

Cave sat down on his chair, shaking off any remaining pieces of dust and straightening any wrinkles. He had to look good for anyone who would view it in the future.

"Mr. Johnson, are you ready?" Caroline asked, standing behind the camera.

"Yeah Caroline, I'll just be a second." Cave straightened everything out and tested the different faces he'd use.

"But Cave, It's already rolling!" 

Cave's face deployed the angry eyebrows look. "Then stop wasting film and turn the damn thing off!"

In shock, Caroline rushed to stop the film from rolling. "I'm sorry, sooo sorry Mr. Johnson, I thought you were ready. I just didn't mean to ruin your week like that."

"It's fine Caroline, it's only a few seconds…"

"Yes but… you're not mad?"

"Don't worry Caroline, it's only a three cent piece of film. Just make sure we're both ready for the real thing this time."

"Right." Caroline readied the camera. No mistakes… Mr. Johnson hated mistakes. "Ready?"

Cave nodded, and the filming began. 

"Good evening fellow citizens of the universe…"

~X~X~X~X~X~

In the deep reaches of Aperture, there was a chamber. The chamber had been prepared, set up especially for this moment. The events leading up to this were fraught with hard work, intense preparation, and untold amounts of government funding.

Everything had led up to this moment. Nobody was as proud at its success or afraid of its failure as Aperture's CEO. For years one of the greatest strides in humanity had been attempted by many by conventional means, but only Aperture could be able to produce the simplest of means to that end.

They sat on an observation platform, overlooking a small sealed room. Cave and Caroline side by side, it was so exciting that the butterflies in their chests had become vicious moths. This would be the biggest endeavor Aperture had ever strived for, and the highest it had ever gone.

Scientists and workers stood in awe as they saw the Aperture logo at the very top of the chamber begin to slide open. They pointed and commented on the unique design, some of them spreading rumors about who created it. But for Cave and Caroline, the logo was not important; it was what lay behind it.

Cave smiled as out from the shadows stepped a man who was in a very heavy white pressure suit. The crowd of scientists cheered as the man was led into the sealed chamber with the help of a couple employees.

But before he entered, he gave one solemn look towards the sky, which had become visible upon the opening of the Aperture logo.

The moon; an ambitious destination to say the least, but with Aperture's portal technology, it was now a point and shoot problem.

The room stilled. All eyes were on Cave.

"Oh uh… guess I should say something." The man held a microphone close to his mouth. He cleared his throat.

"Today, we will… wait a second this damn thing's broken." He threw the microphone to the floor, which made caused a joyous and somewhat loud uplifting from all the scientists. "Now now, no need to applaud," He said, holding his hands out to calm everybody down. "I mean it's not like we're GOING TO THE MOON!" The crowd of scientists cheered at the exclamation.

Caroline just smiled.

"But seriously folks, if this works for the second time, some of you might have to work out of state. And by that I mean ON THE MOON!" Cave's words caused another loud praise from the Aperture crowd. Caroline was starting to see a pattern.

Amidst the loud yelling, one of the scientists stood up in protest. "Do remember Mr. Johnson, that if this creates a black hole which ruins this facility, that it's your fault!" Dr. Muller's words only made the scientists below erupt into even more commotion.

"Quiet… quiet!" Cave managed to quell the boisterous tone which had overcome the chamber. "Now we all know Dr. Muller's work on protecting the facility has been commendable, nobody would disagree with that. But when his work interferes with Aperture growth all we can do-" Cave's next words were drowned out by indistinguishable arguing.

"You don't know the dangers this poses, if this is as bad as we…"

"If you had been here since the beginning, you would've been afraid of everything we…"

"If you'd just listen to what the tests have shown…"

"QUIEEETTT!" Caroline screamed at the top of her lungs. Everyone fell silent at the sight of their favorite manager getting aggressive. "Thank you… now if you'll listen, Dr. Moritz has something to say."

"Ah, why thank you Caroline." Said a scientist who soon became the center of everybody's attention. "In truth, Dr. Muller's fears are not sound. When I helped create the quantum tunneling device, I used an alternating quantum current to modify the molecular transportation signature, Dr. Muller's theory would only work if I used a direct implementation method for matter disposition, he of all people should know that."

The scientists around Cave threw their hands up in a manner similar to as if they were stupid enough forget plugging a machine into an outlet.

"Even though Dr. Muller's worry would be reasonable if we had used that implementation method, it has nothing to do with the current project." Dr. Moritz turned to Cave. "Now, shall we continue?"

Cave smiled at the one man he could always trust. "With pleasure." He rose to his makeshift podium made out of flattened cardboard boxes. "Now then, TIME TO GO TO THE MOON!"

The astronaut returned a thumbs-up sent by Cave, and proceeded to enter the sealed chamber. The sealed chamber had a couple of glass windows, so they could see what was going on inside.

"Sir, we're ready to begin on your mark." Said a man holding a key at nearby control panel.

"Well then, let me mark this as one of Aperture's finest moments." Cave was excited for the project to move on. Now that it had finally come, there was nothing to keep it from moving on. The sealed chamber began to depressurize, there was no time to lose as the moon was now directly above them.

The large mounted portal gun had been activated. It shot outside of the aperture created by the open Aperture logo. Cave held Caroline's hand as the tension rose. "Isn't this exciting Caroline?"

Inside of the sealed chamber, they saw another portal being shot at the wall. A bunch of scientists clapped as they saw their individually assigned jobs paying off, even if for only a few seconds.

Everyone held their breath as the astronaut slowly stepped through the portal. Even Caroline felt her heart skip. Standing up, she tried to get the best view she could, but the wall of the sealed chamber obscured the view past the portal.

"Haha!" Cave heartily yelled, slapping his hands together. "I'm going to make a new desk out of all those moon rocks! Just look at them!"

True to what Cave said, there was an assortment of rocks flying into the chamber. Technically, they were being dropped, but the direction they were falling on the moon became the direction it was rolling on Earth.

"We should do this more often." Cave said as he began to stand up and face Dr. Muller. "See Dr. M, there's nothing to be…"

At that moment, the whole room's mood changed for the worst as the lights started flickering. After a couple seconds, they were back on again. "What just happened?" Cave demanded as a nervous employee manning a control panel became a direct purveyor of the situation. 

"I… I don't know… I…"

Again the lights flickered. Cave was just about to make them call the astronaut back in, but at that moment, a bright flash came from the mounted portal gun.

"Get down!"

Caroline had barely time to react. She didn't know what to do or where to go. They were up on a pretty high ledge, so if there was a bad place to be other than the sealed chamber, it was up there.

She reacted by shielding her eyes from the intense and brief light which came from the tunneling apparatus. A strong force pushed her back and on the ground. It couldn't have come from the explosion of energy; it had to have come from something else. 

She looked up and gasped when she saw Cave holding her tightly. "Mr. Johnson." She couldn't say anything else. Everything came as too much of a surprise.

Cave looked into Caroline's eyes for just a second before releasing his grip from her. He turned around before falling to his knees at the terrible sight.

"No…. NOOO!"

Before him was a much different looking chamber, with the wall near the portal entrance caved in. And there was another part of the wall on the other side of the room, and another over there, and there, and... let's just say it was a mess.

It was also dark, very dark. Usually there was a simulation of daylight throughout the facility, but now there was nothing except for the small hole above which let in moonlight.

"NOOOO!" Cave yelled as loud as he could.

"The emergency lights aren't working!" One of the employees exclaimed. "Its… gone! The power's just gone!" I'm getting nothing, even in the batteries!" 

"Gone? Gone? What do you mean gone? Why the hell wouldn't anything work?" Cave yelled.

"It's as if… some pulse made its way through the facility, I can't get anything to work, not even our flashlights!"

Dr. Moritz moved closer to Cave. Still in shock of what just happened. "It's those amateurs downstairs; they've been messing up this whole facility's power system for weeks. I wouldn't be surprised if they just crippled the facility."

"Crippled the facility?" Cave repeated.

"An electromagnetic pulse such as that probably damaged some of our equipment, which means we're all stuck until it can get fixed."

"Stuck? Stuck?" Cave grew extremely agitated at the mentioning of those words. "That means someone can swoop in and steal our equipment while we're not looking!"

Caroline put her hand on Cave's shoulder. "And it means whoever's stuck in the facility is at the moment completely stuck."

"Including us." Dr. Moritz added as he peered through a dark void of a door. "So Mr. Johnson, we're stuck without technology, we're essentially blind, and we have a couple thousand people trying to claw their way out of pitch black rooms as we speak."

"Including us?"

"Affirmative, Sir."

Cave looked towards the black void and back at Caroline. "Damn."

~X~X~X~X~X~

Author's Notes: **Well now, looks like our story has taken a big change, hasn't it? Not what you were expecting I see. Hopefully, when you have finished reading the chapter you have already calmed down from your screams for more. Here's a secret: The more feedback I get, the more motivated I am to write! Incredible huh? I'm sure you guys have already figured that out by now!**


	4. Coming to Terms

Author's Notes: **Hey, Wow… it's been some time, hasn't it? Thought I'd continue this story for the sake of plunging you readers into a pit of despair which your feeble minded plans will never find a way out of! Your failing efforts to create a substantially structured sentence are useless and above all meaningless! Why do I even bother to write to the cesspool of folly and intellect while I could by presenting my work to the highly literate and esteemed posh of society?**

**Forget everything I just said, or just keep reading since you probably didn't even understand it in the first place. **

**~  
><strong>Coming to terms

Cave Johnson stood atop a looming metal staircase encircling the less tiresome method of transportation; the elevator had failed so now all that was left had to be used manually.

"I think we're almost there…" He noted, speaking to a long line of scientists behind him. "If we can just get to the backup generator, we can get the facility running again. Just hold hands and make sure you don't get separated."

The small collection of scientists weaved through the now dark and unlit parts of Aperture with great diligence. They cared little about not being able to see where they were going for more of their focus was imbedded in the deeply held worries about Aperture itself. With the power gone, everything inside would essentially have to restart, whether it was the testing chambers or the lights. They all worried about what they would do now that they had to only rely on their own wit and not on the trusty hand of technology.

Everyone watched their step closely, because now all they had to see where they were going was a flashlight for each two hands, a pre-caution they had taken due to the recent power failures throughout the facility.

Up from the back of the passing line squeezed Caroline, who ran up towards the front to meet up with Cave.

"Mr. Johnson, Mr. Johnson!" She said, nearly running up the stairs.

"Caroline… what is it?"

"The others back at the presentation chamber said they'll wait for it to come back on, they didn't say anything about trying to rescue the astronaut though, I'm worried about it."

"We can't rescue him now, that damn explosion made sure of that."

"Cave, what does this mean for us?"

Cave looked back at Caroline like she had a poison dart frog just leap off of her forehead. "For whom, _us_ or Aperture."

"well… I don't know… I… I just don't know." 

"There are a lot of things we don't know, such as how we're going to distribute our numbers once we manage to get the power back on."

"Well… Mr. Johnson, I don't know what's going to happen, that's what I'm afraid of."

The group collectively stepped closer to the top of the stairwell; this meant that they were now near Aperture's main power room. "Alright men, find a way to open this door…" Cave said with an invigorating voice. Immediately, the group of no less than twenty scientists got together and scientifically concluded the best way to open the simple door. "That's right, we're Aperture, and we get stuff done…" He said once they managed to twist the flashlight illuminated doorknob.

In a blurred and somewhat convoluted rush of events, the scientists piled into the room, all sorting into their little pre-defined categories of work, twisting this, pulling that, measuring these, and calculating everything in between. Once they went to work starting up the generator, Caroline pulled Cave aside once more so they could speak to each other.

"See? Nothing to be worried about. So what, some of the subjects might be stranded a couple hours in the dark, at least it gives them time to rest."

"Cave, Mr. Johnson, I'm worried about Aperture, about what _they're _going to do now that an astronaut has… gone missing."

"Caroline, you don't have anything to worry about. As long as I'm in charge, it'll be smooth sailing."

Caroline moved closer to her superior. "I don't want to be afraid, I want everything to be normal… I want to run the facility like it's supposed to be run without splitting off into all these tangents. Can't we just do science normally and not jeopardize our ability to do so?"

Cave took a deep breath. "Well, no Caroline… That's not what we need. We need new ideas, big things…"

"But we need to work more on what we already have, look at the quantum tunneling device; we need to focus on that, making it safer and more reliable so we can do ambitious projects like this."

"No, that's not what we need to do." Cave concluded, his face grew tight and construed amongst the newly lit emergency lights. "We need to punch them even harder, show them that we mean business."

"But don't you see? We were doing fine! We even beat out Black Mesa if only for a little bit. We need to put more focus towards testing what we already have so something like this never happens again."

Cave usually listened carefully to Caroline's advice, and more often than not, she turned out to be right about such things. But Cave's desires here were elsewhere, he wanted to go to that moon, he wanted there to be an Aperture Science flag already on there before a country managed to put theirs on it.

"Caroline I… Caroline…" Cave's words failed to echo in the rather open space. The recent disaster had pulled him further away from Caroline, and now he could barely even connect with her.

"Mr. Johnson, listen. Any more of this will bring Aperture lower even as we try to ascend. Please, please don't do any more of this for the sake of the company, for me."

Slowly, the lights began to return, and the hungering depths of Aperture were fed with the brightness that came with the returning hum of the nearby generator. Cave and Caroline found themselves standing close together, much closer than one normally would when abundant light allowed a more distant focus on another.

"I… can't do this alone… will you go through it with me?" Cave asked, astounded by the return of the beautiful landscape.

"Like a cube through an emancipation grill." Caroline leaned in to hug her higher-up, but only for a short time since everyone nearby was in looking range.

"Thanks," said Cave. "I'm certainly going to need it."

In a flowing stream of invisible and silent waves, moved a force through the veins of Aperture Science. It wasn't the revamped electricity, nor was it Caroline's ensuing sense of optimism that drove the mysterious force. Instead, it was time that came to affect Aperture Science. An estranged and choked reputation was what soon followed. With mysteries and conspiracies abounding as to what happened to Aperture's missing astronauts, things very quickly got out of hand.

~X~X~X~X~X~ _Some time later_

"Next, we will have an oral presentation from Cave Johnson, the CEO of Aperture Science."

"Thank you." Cave said as he nervously shuffled the disorganized array of papers in front of him. "By the way, Aperture probably supplies your shower curtains, so that should get me points with you guys right off the bat."

"Mr. Johnson, you are well aware of the recent disappearances of three astronauts, all of whom have not been heard of after entering the doors of your company?"

"Yes, I am. And I can also tell you that science does not come without great sacrifi- I mean… knowing where to hit it."

"I'm… I'm sorry, knowing where to 'hit it'?" The courtroom descended into a confused mumble.

"You know, hit it. Like last week when the Dodgers hit that ball into the outfield and won the game. Sure they may have gotten an out, but in the end, it was the speedy run to home that truly mattered."

"I'm sorry, I don't believe I understand your point."

"My point is this," Cave said with an assured, deep tone. "Aperture Science does what it can to advance science, if I'm correct, did NASA not lose lives with one of their little accidents? So far, it's been my knowledge that nobody has claimed the moon to themselves, and fortunately for us, that's our next destination. If you haven't even placed an American flag onto the surface, how can you say that we have no right to go there ourselves? Who really own the moon? Does it even belong to the inhabitants of earth? Does the moon belong to any nationality or corporation?"

"Mr. Johnson, international treaties aside, let me stop you there. You say that you've already been up there?"

"Yes your honor."

"Well then, that certainly changes things. Tell me Mr. Johnson, what you would change if you were to ever conduct an experiment similar to the one which resulted in the 'disappearance' of these astronauts."

Cave stood proud and tall over his audience. "First, I would make sure that none of it would land me in the Supreme Court. Second, I… I wouldn't allow the desire for increased funding to cloud my judgment and force me to make decisions I would otherwise not even think of."

"So what you're saying Mr. Johnson is that your facility would be much safer if we decreased funding?" The government employees in the chamber all smiled at the implications of the notion.

"No, no! On the contrary, just the er… opposite would be preferable." Cave shamelessly admitted.

"Enough of this nonsense." Another justice spoke up. "Mr. Johnson, ever since you stepped out of the realm of shower curtains, we have been receiving numerous petitions about your… applied science facility and its complete disregard for safety. If you cannot follow regulations, I'm afraid we cannot allow taxpayer dollars to go into allowing your company to grow."

Cave remained silent; he knew this was not the moment for him to continue. Before, Aperture had made it a priority to hire only the best and brightest for their experiments, but now, it would be much more difficult to gain subjects. 

"I'm afraid we cannot trust Aperture Science until they prove that they can follow through with safe and efficient products, I need not remind anyone of the dangers of their failed food supplementary gels." Those words were a kick to Cave's face. "Aperture Innovations should stay within the realm of shower curtains, because that seems to be the only thing they're good at other than losing our American heroes."

~X~X~X~X~X~

Cave sat in his office, not knowing what move to take next. He got up from his seat and opened the nearby drawer. Out he took a picture, it was an older one. In his hand he held a black and white photograph of him and Caroline smiling as they stood outside of an elevator on the surface. From their young and bright faces, he could see a different future, one of happiness and prosperity. But now, it was going to be far more difficult for Aperture to rise. 

In the recent months he and Aperture had co-operatively slipped into a depression and the end of the tunnel unfortunately was far away and unreachable with any portal device. It had been in the best interest in the company to change the style up a bit to suit their growing needs. No longer did people come to them, now they had to go out and find people to be subjected to their often unethical experiments.

A knock came to the door.

"Come in."

Caroline carefully stepped inside the room. "Hey Mr. Johnson."

"Caroline…"

"I… just wanted to see what you were doing."

"Caroline, I'm trying to tune my brain to listen to radio signals; so far it's not working." Cave took a couple of shiny rocks from his pocket. "So far, I've heard a little Elvis, but that doesn't prove anything significant."

Caroline sighed as she approached Cave's messy and disorganized desk. "Is there a problem with your radio?"

"It's knob is broken, I don't think even our best engineers could fix it now."

Caroline picked up the small device. "Oh, don't talk like that; see you were just turning it the wrong way!" She said, then placing it back onto the wooden desk.

Cave's face was immensely stunned once he heard the sound of Elvis blasting in his office. "I knew it! I knew it! It's working it's a miracle!" he grew disheartened once he figured out the sound was actually coming from the radio. "Oh… I thought for a second." He shook his head. "Nevermind."

"Why haven't you cleaned up in here? And what are these doing here?" She held up a group of photographs which were taken while orbiting the moon. "are you still mad about that?"

"No, no no no no… I'm fine! I'm fine! Everything's fine! I'm only seeing the beautiful company that I started crumbling before my very eyes! How do you think I feel to see my future slowly start to fade away while Black Mesa continues to soar past us while all we can do is watch!"

"Cave…"

"I don't want sympathy, I want a way to change this."

"Cave…"

"It's not my fault the quantum tunneling device decided to fail, It's not my fault this all happened."

"Cave, if you don't want any sympathy, stop asking for it?"

"Huh?" Cave turned to Caroline, more confused by her words than by women themselves.

"Listen, I know it's going to be harder, and I know it won't be easy, we just have to look to the future to see what it offers! Sure, we might have to pick test subjects off the streets now, but living on the streets has to be bracing!"

"But what if the future doesn't want to follow us?"

"I can't believe I'm hearing that from the man who started the company from practically nothing."

Cave was hit with a hammer pounding with a disheartening blow.

"You started it all, we can't give up now. Aperture's the same as it always was; we're still the best damn applied science company in the world." Caroline tried to retain her own giggle. "Who cares what Black Mesa thinks, or those justices? We're still Aperture, not because we squiggle through the ground like worms, but because we bury our competition! We don't need to listen to what they say, do they pay the bills?"

"No." Cave said softly.

"I said do they pay the bills?"

"No." He repeated a little more sternly this time.

"Do they? Do they? I think they do…"

"They sure as hell don't!" Cave yelled with a loud and booming voice.

~X~X~X~X~X~

Author's Notes: **Please review if you like! If you don't, review anyways because it'll be much easier on your pet goldfish if you do!**


	5. Cake and Caroline

Author's notes: **I have no idea why what I'm doing.**

~  
>Cake and Caroline<p>

"Ok, for this next test… oh that's just great- we're gonna how the human body reacts to a shift in reactive velocity and a slowing timescape. Basically, that means we're making everything look like it's slowing down, but it's not, so don't try jumping off that ledge over there because you _won't_ fall in slow motion like everything else in the room." Cave pressed the off button on the pre-recorded messenger. He quickly removed the tape which was just inside and replaced it with another one from the stack.

"Alright… for this next test you'll wear a special 'tuna suit', then we'll put you on the center of a spinning carousel surrounded by six cats, now theoretically the cats should all approach you at the same speed, but as it starts to spin faster and faster, the closest cats will sort of oscillate in a wave like pattern until they finally reach the center and lick ya to death…" he backed off from the device, laughing. "Trust me, that's the fun part… but you won't actually die of course, that's just… you'll still get your sixty bucks."

"If you're an organ donor this next test will be perfect for you. Not because it involves you and a messy array of body parts, but because you'll be playing an actual organ to see its effects on… ion beam fluctuations? What the hell? Oh, that's right, we'll point one of these bad boys in your direction and just see what happens… and in case you're wondering… being an organ donor won't help… that was just a pun."

He removed the new tape and placed it onto a loosely organized pile of recorded messages, making sure he placed it near the middle so as not to disrupt the equilibrium he had created.

He then picked up the red 'hot-phone' and called into it, "Caroline, could you come here please?" 

Cave prepared a new tape, but stopped when he discovered that he'd reached the end of the long list of testing chambers. All the tapes had been correctly labeled for their respective places, ready to be distributed.

"I came as soon as I could Mr. Jo- oh, I see you've already finished another stack." Caroline said as she slowly approached the newly finished collection of recordings. "I'll just, take them down and…"

"That won't be necessary…" Cave urged, pushing his hand out near the tapes. "Not yet at least."

"Well why not?" Caroline returned.

"Because I-" Cave eyed the wooden clipboard Caroline was tucking on the inside of her shoulder. "Because I want to see those reports first." He pointed to the monthly summaries.

"The… reports." Caroline started to glance at the pages, but quickly removed her eyes from them once she remembered its contents. Her hands shook and her breathing escalated into a fearful rhythm.

"Yes, the reports…" Cave pressured again, now with a more inexorable compulsion. "I would like to see them."

"You… you don't need to see the reports." Caroline said, pulling the reports closer to her chest, she then spun herself away from Cave and avoiding any possible semblance to even a slight form of eye contact, separating them with a cage of secrets.

"I want to see those reports!" Cave got up from his chair, which made Caroline jolt as she tried to hide the slipping statements from the CEO.

"I'll take the tapes down…"

"No, I want to see what you're holding!"

"We'll talk about them later!" Caroline insisted.

Cave marched up to her. "I want to see those reports damnit!" Immediately, he yanked the clipboard out of Caroline's hand, ripping some of the pages and causing others to float to the ground. After the strange occurrence, Cave and Caroline both looked at each other for only a second, their faces both afraid and unsure. Cave's own face tightened as he began a slow and awkward search to the financial section. He dared himself to even look at the page, opening his eyes took more effort than anything at that moment; his heart sank when he finally saw the numbers he was looking for.

He looked tense, but he didn't let his anger out on Caroline or the clipboard, instead, he softly dropped the clipboard, and returned to sink in his chair.

Caroline rushed to pick the fallen papers back up and return them to their ordered places.

"I'm sorry Mr. Johnson… I…"

"No, I'm sorry Caroline. I shouldn't have done that, I… I should have let you tell me when you thought the time was right."

Caroline still hid her face from her boss.

"So, we're behind Black Mesa once more… we were just about eclipsing them too… I don't understand, how could this have happened!?"

"Mr. Johnson, there's nothing we could've done! They cut our funding, and Black Mesa's just boosted because they were contracted to help construct more ICBM's, that's all!"

"It's not that simple! Soon, there will be a Black Mesa Space Station, and then a Black Mesa Moon Base; do any of those include Aperture Science being the center of attention?"

"Mr. Johnson, they've only been there once! You just wait, a few more trips and they'll eventually figure out how hard it is to-."

"I admire your optimism Caroline, but I have to disagree. I mean the Wright Brothers started flying less than seventy years ago, forty years from now they'll be making trips to the moon every day with commercial spaceliners." 

"But that's a long time!" Caroline added, approaching Cave with her hands laid out towards him. "By then, Aperture will be the one on top!"

"How do you know that will happen!?" Cave yelled.

Caroline shied away from her boss. 

"Caroline, please."

"I'll take these tapes down to the labs… they'll be able to sort them out once they hear them." Caroline clumsily fumbled as she tried to grab the tapes. "I've gotta go." She began to stumble out of the office.

"Caroline…" Cave tried to say but his voice didn't allow him to speak beyond a weak threshold.

Caroline left the room, the door closed behind her like a portal closing on Cave's device. Saddened, the CEO returned to his ritualistic mourning of Aperture's losses.

~X~X~X~X~X~

A lonely Cave walked down a lonely street in a lonely town. Sadly, this was where the bulk of recruits for Aperture's newest testing initiatives came from. He passed a bus stop where an Aperture Science propaganda poster stood, faded and worn.

'_What will you do with your sixty dollars?'_ The words posed as a backdrop to an overambitious picture of a man clutching handfuls of money as he stood in front of a newly purchased yacht.

Cave walked further, past another street and into an empty park. He figured he had to get out of Aperture for once and just see the world not as Cave Johnson, but as someone else, someone who held no position of great stature. He needed a break from Aperture, away from the gloom and utter depression imposed by the rising monster of Black Mesa, from the failure of the destructive events and the endless releasing of worthless products. The once great Aperture Science had fallen.

Out from the dark limits of his sight walked a lone man who was most likely as lost as Cave. The man didn't notice Cave until he had reached the bench where he was sitting.

"Cave? Cave Johnson?" Said the man, who had just stopped in utter surprise at the startling realization. "No way!"

"Who are you?" Cave asked, both confused and somewhat unnerved.

"I'm… my name is Nathan… Nathan Halpert… I work at Aperture Science as a systems engineer."

"Oh… that's why I don't know you." Cave remarked. "You wouldn't by any chance be one of the people responsible for the power outages would you?"

"No…" Nathan replied. "But I did help bring it back on multiple occasions." The engineer simply couldn't believe he was talking to the man who was widely revered by much of Aperture to be some kind of mythological figure, who towered over the cultivated masses, spreading words of science and happiness. "So why are you here?" He said, trembling in the presence of his superior. 

"You don't have to be so scared, I don't know why people seem to be so afraid when they first see me."

"Oh you see… the lab guys usually complain about the pre-recorded messages and stuff because they think they're… they think they're unneeded."

"But you're not a lab boy are you?" Cave queried.

"No no, but every time a toaster stops working they call guys like me to fix it, so I'm exposed to them a lot I guess." 

Cave laughed, lightening the before tense mood.

"So… what are you doing out here?"

"Me? You know, time to get out and stretch, breathe some fresh air."

"You sure it's not because of Aperture's troubles?"

"Troubles? What do you mean trouble?" Cave conceded to the facts. "Alright, I will admit that Aperture's stuck at the moment, but I'm sure that in time we'll be able to find a way out of this gooey problem."

"How are we going to do that?" Nathan asked.

"By building our own goo to get us out of it. No, seriously."

"Well, whatever you decide on, make sure it puts science in front of everything else."

"What do you think I am, a fifth-grader? This is Aperture; of course we're going to put science ahead of everything else! We don't need to care about what others tell us to do! You hear that Black Mesa!"

"Yeah! We don't need to care!" Nathan repeated.

"We don't need to follow others off the cliff!"

"Yeah! We're independent!"

"We don't need to repeat what other people say!"

"Yeah! Don't repeat what other people say!"

"We're Aperture Science damn it!"

"Yeah! And we're going to bury you in a triple layer of creamy chocolate!"

"Wait what?" Cave questioned.

"Oh it's, just this thing they're having this week at Manny's, it's a promotional buy one get one free deal."

"Three layers huh?" Cave said as he held his chin.

"Yeah, the first layer's dark chocolate, the second is a smooth, white chocolate and the thi-"

"Hey Nate, what do you think about Aperture Science's newest testing initiative?"

Nathan was a bit startled at the change in subject. He secretly wanted Cave to give in and buy the cake for both of them.

"Newest ini- I don't know which one you're talking about…"

"You know, the one where two test subjects walk into a restaurant and see what the whole fuss is about that cake." Cave said with an cheery but still elusive tone.

"Oh… that sounds nice…" Nathan tried to hide away his excitement.

"Of course it does! Let's go!"

"Sure thing boss!"

_The two Aperturians skipped along on their joyful endeavor to Manny's restaurant, ready to meet the future with a high five and a ready fork._

~X~X~X~X~X~

Cave set yet another tape down on the table. It had been a long day, and he was eager to take a break from the tiresome events flooding Aperture.

The CEO pressed a button on the nearby communication device. "Caroline, could you… wow that was fast." Cave said once he saw the lovely assistant enter the office. "We're you standing outside of the door waiting for me to call you?"

"Yes…" 

"How proactive of you…"

"I know… it hasn't been too busy recently and I wanted to surprise you…"

"Well, mission accomplished."

"Do you want me to take these down?"

"No… I wanted to talk to you about another plan I had." Cave inconspicuously slid the large drawer closed. He would have time to finish that cake later.

"Go on…"

"I've been thinking a lot about ways to get more volunteers for testing. Now that they've stopped coming to us, it's time for us to come to them."

"We've already set the sixty bucks plan into motion, what else could there be to entice new test subjects?" Caroline wondered.

"I'd like to tell you… tonight I mean."

"Tonight?"

"Yes… tonight at Manny's."

"Why do we need to go there for you to tell me?"

"Show you… I'm going to show you."

"Well… alright then…"

"Seven thirty?"

"Seven thirty." Caroline acknowledged, slipping outside of the door.

~X~X~X~X~X~

Caroline shifted in her vinyl window seat. The sun had already fallen over the horizon but its light still lingered on the distant clouds and the soft touch of the fading far away sky. Cave took his own seat on the opposite side of Caroline's.

"So… why are we here? Are we celebrating?" Caroline asked.

"No just… I need to show you my plan firsthand."

"Mr. Johnson what do you mean?" Caroline asked, glancing at the menu.

"That's fine Caroline, I'll order for us…"

"Cave?"

"Hello, my name's Dave and I'll be your server tonight… What can I get you tw…. You…" The waiter said once his eyes fell on Cave.

"Oh, you're the manager aren't you?" Cave asked.

Caroline lowered herself away from the volcano which was bound to erupt.

"Yes I… am the manager as well." The man took out a small notebook. "Will you be ordering from the menu this time?"

"We'll both take the triple layered choclaggedon."Cave answered, prompting an uncomfortable look from the manager.

"Uh… sir…"

"What? It's on the menu right here; its text is takes up half the fold!"

"We're out of them…"

Cave dropped his menu as he looked in horror outside the window. All his hopes of achieving magnificent cake powered bliss had been systematically flushed out and stomped on at that moment. "I see…"

"But he have other desserts, there's a wide assortment of ice crea-"

"No that won't be necessary…" Cave directed. "I'll just have the cheeseburger…"

"Same here…" Caroline motioned, speaking quickly and assertively. "We both like ours medium…"

"Alright… that makes it simple. I'll be back in a few." The manager walked away, but not without giving a brief death glare exchange between him and Cave.

Caroline smiled, resting her chin on the palm of her hand. "So… I guess you wanted to surprise me with the chocla… choclgid"

"Choclaggedon, I had it about a week ago when I heard one of the employees glorifying its wonders. It's a damn good cake too."

"So… you wanted to talk about cake?" Caroline looked confused.

"Yes actually. I wanted to show you how much cake can influence a person. I've been thinking about how Aperture might be able to use cake to stretch the limits of test subjects."

"So you were going to use this outing as a… an experiment? This is all a clever underhanded plan to influence me to like you more isn't it?"

"It sounds really stupid when you say it but, yes."

"Oh Mr. Johnson, how thoughtful of you!" Caroline squealed as she squeezed one of the CEO's cheeks.

~X~X~X~X~X~

Author's Notes: **Yep! The Cake is a Lie! HAHA! Seriously though, how else would I have introduced something so discredited and overused in a subtle way? lol**


	6. Auto-correct

~  
>Auto-correct<p>

It was some time later that Cave realized where **Aperture** was truly going. In the years after the accident Aperture Science paid the price of its slowly fading existence, barely managing to collect funds from older products and soon to be outdated innovations of which they had once been the main producer. Currently in these still occupied remains of a once great Aperture stand the two most powerful people to walk the asbestos lined walls.

"Next week's launch will probably be the last one…" Caroline noted as she monitored the stream of Aperture's advanced auto typewriter, which was at this moment receiving transmissions from the core monitoring team. "That means… we're free to buy as much we want. For another few years at least, who knows how much space we'll be able to hoard in the meantime? The rocks should provide a good surface material for the handheld portal devices."

"You sure the Russians won't have a go?" Cave asked, also watching the typewriter as it haphazardly recreated the core manager's words into lines of text. "It would be very awkward to run into them while we're trying to find a good place to pick up lunar rocks."

"The real challenge **is** getting off of Earth without catastrophically blowing up; they've most likely dropped their N1 rocket as a viable option for space travel, so unless they've taken one of our portal systems from us I don't see them travelling anytime soon." Cave gave Caroline a faint suspicious look, one which was only recognizable to someone who had experience reading Cave's facial expressions. "Which they don't have of course…"

"Right…" Cave returned to the automatic speech-to-text translator, still decoding the last of the manager's message. "I'm telling you Caroline, these things will be the communication of the future, imagine, no longer having to talk to that relative with the sandpaper for a throat voice, now you can read their words instead of listening to them. Beautiful, isn't it?"

Caroline nodded; she then plucked the fresh paper from the auto-writer and began to read it aloud.

"Mr. Johnson, we've coordinated with the eel wreck trickle… wha?" Caroline halted in confusion at the strange words written on the paper, but then smiled when she weaved through the error. "Oh… I suppose it means 'electrical'… silly translator."

"Continue…" Cave ordered, miffed at the interruption.

"With the electrical team working around the clock on our grid's surge protection system, thanks to him prove mints- I mean, improvements in the Maine seek wincing, we will now have no more blackouts due to a fix in the stability damp innards… stability dampener's primary drive routing. Due to this there will be an automatic shutdown of sector-6b's local power grid during any pro seed your- _procedure_ involving the new clear power generators, but be advised, none of this will hinder any progress the team is work **in **hard two attain. Signed, Nathan Halpert." Caroline looked away from the printed paper. "That's all it says, it spelled his name wrong too..."

"Hmmm, if only we could get it to make sense…"

"Mr. Johnson, if I might say, the translator seems to have greatly improved on its capabi-"

"No, it's not the translator, Caroline, its Nathan… I don't know what the hell he meant- he's just babbling in sciencey nonsense to sound smart. I'm not sure if he even knows what he's saying."

"Oh, well… he says the grid's been improved so that there won't be any more accidents with the power, which also means,"

"We can go back…" Cave said with a large and deeply rooted smile. His mind ascended to an odd memory, a memory of the future. There would be nothing to hold them back now, except for themselves. "We can return to the moon, this time without repercussion."

"Mr. Johnson, don't you remember whe-"

"Damn it that was almost four years ago Caroline!" Cave let out, almost pushing the woman backward with the forceful intensity of his words. "Imagine how much this will advance our portal devices! Just imagine!" 

"I know Mr. Johnson, but… don't you think we should wait a little before we can devote more resources into…"

"Damn the resources Caroline, this is what we need to get _out_ of this valley, our boys down below have planned a whole bunch of projects that require materials we can only find on the lunar surface."

"But Mr. Johnson, I don't know if we've gone through enough testing to know if we're ready for such a move." Caroline urged in a forward motion, shaking her head.

"Testing… testing." Cave turned back to the automatic text machine, marveling at its sublime technological level and its rigid practicality. In the recent years, Aperture had slipped, and he was hoping that small innovations like this would help bring them back from the slump; however, not even these machines were selling enough to break even. That is of course if they reached to point of selling them anyway, and currently there wasn't much of a market for Aperture's products, and most of the time, they were impractical or impossible to **control**. "So much testing and so little using… I'm afraid by the time we reach the moment where we're 'ready' it'll already be too late."

"But we don't want to rush into it either, we need to take it slowly, enjoy the rare moments without chaos. We **don't** need to go back, we can buy rocks to help make more of that gel."

"We won't get the chance to rush into it if we don't… wait what?" Cave sat confused at his sentence. "What I mean is that we're Aperture Science and we don't cut corners even if those corners are covered with giant neon signs saying 'please cut me'. When the time is right we'll know, I mean when has science failed us?"

Caroline attempted to retrieve the memory of the unfortunate turning point in Aperture's history. "There was that time whe-"

"No, don't answer that, I meant it in a personal way." 

"Personal way?" Caroline repeated, unsure of what her boss meant. "What do you mean?"

"That's not the perfect way to state it but…" Cave took a deep sigh. "It's between… it's… forget it."

Caroline turned away, ending the conversation's tangent. Not wanting to probe into original thought any further, Caroline returned to the automatic text machine, she figured it was time to remove it and then return the machine to the lab boys, whom in their science centered basements were eagerly awaiting the results of its failure and the chance to turn that it into success. She neared it and was about to unplug it when Cave stopped her.

"Caroline wait…" Cave said, softly.

"What is it Mr. Johnson?"

"I don't want you to remove the auto-adapter… not yet at least" Cave requested, calling the machine by its officially designated name.

"I'm just going to take it down to get adjusted." Caroline illustrated with a facial gesture directed at the floor.

"I wanted to… actually **try** it out myself first… if that's possible."

Caroline removed her hand from the translating module, which was resting just above the large computer's processing module. She pondered the notion, not knowing whether to advance by means of acceptance or rejection. "I don't know… I think this only contains the output, you can't speak into it, but you can receive someone else's words."

"Hmmm, can we get one of the input modules up here so we can test it?"

"No it won't work, these things were integrated into the different departments, taking them out of those places isn't an easy task, and really it would just be easier to go down there and speak into them and then come back to read it." 

"Doesn't this have an input module?" Cave asked.

"It does, but it's connected with the one down near the core, messages can only be transmitted with this one from here to there."

"Then let's go." Cave said, getting up from his cushiony custom built Aperture seat.

"Wha? Mr. Johnson… please don't leave yet."

"You're right Caroline I need to say something. Thanks for reminding me I almost forgot." Cave ran over to the text translator and pressed the talk button. He wasn't necessarily worried about its effectiveness of the device itself but more accurately he was genuinely curious about whether or not the guys downstairs would even receive the message. "Eh… say something." He told Caroline.

"Ok… I wish I had some cake right now." Caroline giggled.

"What flavor?"

"I'd like **a chocolate walnut cake**, with, strawberries on top of sugar cream lining the edge in a circle…" 

"Stop it, you're making me hungry."

"You wouldn't eat any cake if you weren't."

"Good catch, Caroline. Nathan, make sure to retrieve a cake from the dispensary, we'll be down there shortly."

~X~X~X~X~X~

"Hey Nathan, what's wrong? You look like you've just received your tax form; we're in the middle of December! Relax! Christmas will be here soon."

"It's… the adapter. **It's** transmitting a message right now, see? Something about… cake?"

"Cake? Hey that reminds, me, wanna check out the new dispensary later? I hear they mostly serve test subjects, but they'll allow some employees to a slice."

"I don't have time today, Chris. Actually the coolant guys were thinking about heading to Manny's later, that is if they MONITOR** those graphite tips like they should!**" Nathan echoed loud and clear so that the engineers sitting in the corner could hear him. "So no, I'd love some cake, but not today."

"We'll that's a shame. The test subjects love it apparently, I mean most of them. I heard this one guy lost his sense of taste after he tried licking the edge of a portal field. It might actually work in his favor though, now he can eat anything!"

"Are you going to say anything important now? Or can I get back to my work?" Nathan said with a stern direction in his tone. "I have a new team of incompetent core analysis engineers who can't tell a megawatt from an emancipation grid, and I've got a high priority message coming in from Mr. Johnson himself… about cake apparently… I'm not getting paid enough." He reassured himself.

After reading the first line of the paper, Nathan was already convinced that the rest of the content was going to end up worthless anyways. He shut the machine down before it could finish its message, already he could see the errors in the translation. "What is it with him and Caroline?" He asked Chris, turning towards where he was mere seconds ago, only to find that he was no longer there. "Chris?" He searched the room with his watchful eyes, but couldn't find him on the upper catwalks, or near the control station, or anywhere.

Nathan returned to his duty as core manager. Not much would happen that day, except for Cave taking him aside from his work to show the nuclear team administrator his plan to create another secret of Aperture Science.

~X~X~X~X~X~

"You see Halpert; these rocks provide the perfect material for our handheld portal devices to work with. Now with these new conversion gels free for us to use as we please, we can finally begin the stages towards further development and then a long way down the road, release." Cave led Nathan down a highly restricted walkway and into a large room filled with assorted machinery, cutting and molding white slabs and then transporting them further along on a mainline conveyer belt. "At Aperture Science, we don't cut corners," He said, leaning next to a machine with automatic arms slicing the edges off of one of the rectangular pieces. "Except with these things, those are corner cutting machines, but they don't count, they just cut." He then walked over to a large vat sitting at the corner of the room.

"What's this?" Nathan asked, pointing at the steel gray drum.

"It's a container of course… can't you see?"

"What's _inside of_ it?"

Cave chuckled, knowing what he meant all along. "Good thing you asked, because I've already prepared an answer for you with one of my pre-recorded messages." He pulled a small metal latch on the vat of gel down, showing a clear glass window behind the new opening which itself uncovered a flowing stream of chalky white goop, this action also initiated **a** nearby message with Caroline's voice on it.

"Here is where we refine our conversion gel, after crushing up those million dollar moon rocks, they come here and mix with our special mixture of Aperture Sticky Slick Bonding Agent™ and a super secret substance we found in the basement so it doesn't slide off those walls after it joins with the surface. Those adorable lab boys do a great job at making sure these gels are nice and clean! You could even brush your teeth with them I think!"

"You're making toothpaste out of moon rocks?" Nathan asked with partial disgust. "You're making toothpaste out of moo- You actually put that stuff inside your mouth?"

"It's one of the… many uses. I call it moon paste. Don't know if it really works yet, but it keeps my teeth nice and white! Now don't judge me; it's probably a lot safer than that crap you rub into your gums anyways… that reminds me, Caroline!"

"Yes Mr. Johnson?" Caroline dutifully rushed over to Cave at the mentioning of her name; on her face was a smile bright enough to cheer a dispirited orphan who was just forced to jump over pits of imminent death.

"Can you go down to the lab boys and request a study on the organic health benefits of conversion gel?"

"Right away Mr. Johnson!"

"You brush your teeth with that stuff?" Nathan still stared in amazement at the vat of gel. 

"Oh and, Caroline?"

"Yes Mr. Johnson?"

"Let the lab boys know we're _not_ going to space anytime soon, it's just a lot easier to buy the damn rocks at this point believe it or not, and I don't want them getting excited. You know how they'll explode at the chance so… I don't know; tell them to create weaponized hamsters or something."

"O…k… Mr. Johnson."

"You… put that on your… what?"

"You really don't believe me do you?" Cave could see that Nathan had strong doubts about Cave's claim. "Caroline, could you come over here?"

Caroline halted in her tracks; Cave rarely gave so many successive requests to her. "Yes?"

"Mr. Halpert doesn't believe me that I use this stuff as a substitute for toothpaste."

Caroline giggled, covering her mouth.

"What! You believe him Caroline?"

"Well, I have noticed a positive change in his breath…"

"Wha…"

"And it doesn't taste too bad either…" Caroline looked over to Cave with her signature 'smile until something dies' expression. They both shared an unconscious sputtering of laughter with each other in that moment, which if they were to continue, would become intermingled with an assortment of jokes strange and very unfunny to anyone else.

"You mean you use that stuff too?" Nathan asked, surprised.

"No… Only Mr. Johnson…"

"Then… how do…"

Cave patted Nathan heavily on the back. "Mr. Halpert, how about I show around a little more?" He gave Caroline a wink with his left eye then two from his right, which was only part of a secret code he and Caroline developed a while back telling her to get back to her duties.

"Show me around? Why am I even here? I don't even work in this department."

"Funny you should ask. The uh… manager of the pumping department tried to use some of the orange Aperture speed gel to try and boost 'productivity' or whatever, you know, make people get from here to there faster, didn't work. So six broken legs and three weeks of drawn out safety inspections later, he slipped and fell out of the exit, Hah! Get it? 'Cause he was fired!"

"Let me guess, you want me to be the new manager?" Nathan asked, worried that his suspicions might be right and equally afraid that Cave had something else in mind.

"Actually, I was planning on you and Dr. Moritz fighting to the death over the position in a daring battle of wits, but, I knew he'd probably win, so I'm picking you for the fun of it and just watch where it goes… see, that was a **lie** in case you couldn't tell… Besides, if I offered Dr. Moritz the position, he wouldn't be able to yell at me every day about how all my ideas are going to hurt people, and that's it's too dangerous, whatever. And even if he could yell at me, he's still shaken after that whole moon debacle a few years ago, so I'd doubt he'd want to be surrounded by these moon rocks all day, he says it'll gives him headaches."

"So… what about the new core manager?"

"Christopher seems competent enough, he'll be a fine core manager, and he also knows exactly where the cake dispensary is located, so he can get me some whenever I come down, unlike the old one."

Nathan drooped in shame.

"Oh wait you're the old one now! Huh, funny how that works. Anyways, you're first job as pumping station manager is to make me a new desk."

"What?"

"Just kidding, I want you to make a desk with the top made out of moon rocks, I kind of like the smell, I don't know why…" Cave presided over a wide room, where thick pipes protruded from the walls and all collected into a central hub where the gels were distributed to each.

"Of what, the moon rocks?" Nathan's face contorted in confusion

"No, of science! I love the smell of science! Now get to work before you have an unfortunate accident and have to be removed under shady and mysterious circumstances… that was a joke too… by the way."

~X~X~X~X~X~

Author's Notes: **Hey, it's me again. Yeah, I know that reading these notes must feel like snails getting stuck in between your toes and just puking like crazy, but you know, I think it brings us closer together. So here I was yesterday, minding my own business when this guy walked up to me and asked me if I had any pressurized cans of air from the Netherlands… wait, you've already heard that story? Good to know.**

**Also, some of you may be confused about how little 'romance' there seems to be between Cave + Caroline… read the title! It's supposed to be romantic with science! Do you not understand! /ragemodeoff If you've read this far, I guess that means something. **


	7. The Beginning of the End

Author's Notes: **mmmkay, so this is going to be it… the last chapter. I can't say that I'm completely satisfied with it, but I feel that it's a decent interpretation of mine. I know this story might not have been what anyone expected, even from me honestly, but I hope that in the end you'll be able to put this down and, go pet some puppies or something, after all, that's the whole point of my stories.**

The Beginning of the End

The office was dark, both resulting from the fading color of the walls and the poor lighting which was cast down from above. Although it was technically one of the highest points in Aperture, the office still managed to carry a deep and unnerving portion of the facility with it.

Caroline did her best to stealthily enter her boss' room. She knew that he'd been working essentially nonstop for the span of a few days, and that he might not like the presence of her loud movements. She softly closed the door behind her, noticing that Cave was indeed asleep on his large black chair. It was a rare sight to see him doze off where he spent most of the day here at the quiet upper reaches of Aperture, but recently, there had been something bugging him, exhaustion was merely a side effect of such times. Knowing that it was best not disturb the man from his well-needed, Caroline cautiously removed the papers from her hand, and ever so quietly, opened the top left drawer of the mahogany desk and neatly placed them inside.

"Caroline…" Cave spoke up, awakening. In the shock of his sudden movement, he put his hand on top of Caroline's to calm her down, a brief cough erupting from his chest. His skin was pale and drained of energy, the only color which stood out was a sickly green and dark blue, and his seat sagged under the continuous weight of his body.

"Yes, it's me." Caroline affirmed, not knowing if her boss was completely awake or just wanting to ask her something.

"Caroline…" Cave took his hand away from his assistant, sputtering into a resurging bout of coughing which pushed him forward from his chair and towards the desk. "Pills…" He pointed to a small box at the edge of the desk, too far away for him to comfortably reach with his outstretched hand.

Caroline handed the man the bottle of analgesic relief, he promptly consumed a couple of them with the aid of an Aperture Digestion Gel.

"Your breathing seems to be getting worse…" Caroline said, holding the man's shoulders to keep him down. "Are you sure you don't need the mask?" She asked, worriedly.

Cave dispelled Caroline's worries with a show of his open hand. "No, I'm fine… It's my kidney's I'm worried about… ough!" He violently jerked forward, holding the front of his head. "Damn it!" He yelled, frustrated over the painful and unpredictable headaches he'd been more frequently getting. Cave often refused the help of others, he wanted to be self-reliant, but his growing age, coupled with his worsening sickness, made it so painful that it was almost impossible to function on his own.

Caroline wished there was something she could do to help, but whatever her boss' problems were beyond control, especially for someone of his advanced age. The recent years had been a struggle for everyone at Aperture, but especially for Cave when it came to medical issues. It began soon after he paid 70 million for those moon rocks; he knew that the substance would be beneficial in creating better forms of gels, but in the end, the costs outweighed the perks by many orders of magnitude, both scientific and financial.

"Caroline… Caroline," Cave struggled to say, his breathing hindering his speech with intermittently painful sessions of uncontrollable coughing. He pointed to the recently hidden paper, requesting the contents of it as he did every week. "The memo… what's it say?"

The woman paused for a moment, not knowing whether to tell the man the truth or whatever else she could hope to develop in those few seconds. The information she'd just stowed away was not meant for his eyes while he was in this mood, then again, it wasn't good for him during any mood, but Caroline understood that it was necessary. "It's not a memo… we switched those to electronic, remember?" Caroline answered, nudging the small computer screen on the desk.

"Oh… right. *Cough* Well then, what is it?"

"It's… a medical report…" Caroline slowly conceded the information as she retrieved the piece of paper from the drawer. As soon as it became exposed, Cave abruptly snatched the paper out of Caroline's hand.

Cave examined it for a few moments, scanning down the lines of information detailing blood work, respiratory results, and kidney damage. He then threw the paper onto the floor upon finding the important parts of the results. "Damn it!" He yelled again, frustrated at the revelation. The news to him was about as comforting as watching a basket of kittens being placed near a pack of rabid dingoes.

"Mr. Johnson…"

*Cough* *Cough* "…what?"

"Are you ok?" Caroline wondered, examining Cave's weak and sickly looking face which through the recent years had only deteriorated more the harder they attempted to fix it, much like the company itself.

"Caroline… I've noticed how you've been managing the company during my... illness… I've watched how you work things out… resolve issues, and found the right people for the right jobs… you've found the right projects to pursue… I want *Cough* it to stay the same… I need something to stay the same in this always changing world."

Caroline tightened her lips upon hearing Cave's words. She knew his deeper intention was to make her the CEO of Aperture, since he most likely wouldn't reach the end of the decade at the rate that his health was declining. She was too humble to ask herself, or move in that direction. But ever since the start of the 80's he'd been like this, it took them a while to realize that the primary cause of the deteriorating effects were due to the exposure of moon rocks, which Cave had spent a great amount of time exploring. 

"Maybe we weren't meant to go explore the moon… maybe *Cough* *Cough*… maybe this is its way of protecting its property."

"Mr. Johnson…" Caroline returned against her boss' odd statement.

"No, Caroline, I know what's really going on… *Cough* we just took things too fast and didn't take any necessary precautions… I mean, that's why Aperture's… like this! We reached into the future and tried pulling it closer towards us… we weren't ready for it; we barely even understood what would come! How stupid *Cough* *Cough* could we have been Caroline!? We look back on it now and it seems like we had no idea what we were doing… like we had technologies and advancements so powerful we didn't know what to do with them."

"What are you getting at, Mr. Johnson?"

"What I'm getting at is *Cough* what we have now is so much greater than what we had then. Just think about all the things we'll have twenty years from now… things we can't even imagine today will be merely common in the future… I only wish I could be there to see it all…"

"Mr. Johnson… remember that time when… when the facility lost power… and none of us knew what to do? Remember when you were the one who led us to the generator, and managed to turn the power back on…" Her voice fell, she understood that she was approaching the hush-hush depths of the 'missing astronauts' ordeal, and that Cave wouldn't enjoy diving into that painful moment of history. 

"And when you stood up to the restaurant manager when they said they didn't have any omelets… and when you stood up to him again after he told you they were out of cake… Do you remember Cave? All those times we had? All the great things we did?"

Cave gave a brief but still very noticeable smile, a rare sight from him in the more recent times. "Yeah, I remember… but that was all years ago, Caroline. I remember when we didn't have to pick new recruits off the streets, I remember when they'd come to _us_ instead of being the other *Cough Cough* way around… now we're lucky if we can get any employees to volunteer." His coughs progressively got more intense and frequent. He had to rest his head against the chair and breathe deeply in order to temporarily alleviate the convulsive reactions.

"Mr. Johnson, are you alright?" Caroline asked, knowing very well that her boss was in more pain than he was showing.

"I'm *Cough* hold on, Caroline… The pills just haven't taken effect yet…" Cave motioned for Caroline to leave the bottle alone. "Caroline… I need you to keep managing the facility… I need you to help keep Aperture at its full potential. I can't… I can't like this…"

Caroline started to step away from the desk, nodding. "Mr. Johnson… You'll be fine? You don't need anything else?" She asked subconsciously opening herself up to anything that her boss may have needed.

Cave shook his head. "Caroline… *Cough* the only thing you can do to help me right now is to help Aperture. Do it the same way that you've been doing it recently. You've been managing it well, keep up the good work."

"Well, sir… we'll still be doing science." With that, Caroline left her boss' room with the full resolve of his leadership guiding her. Cave coughed a couple more times before moving towards a message recording device he'd always kept on the desk through the years, sometimes as informative reminders, and sometimes as personal journals. He pressed the record button on the side after making sure a fresh tape was inside.

"_The point is, if we can store music on a compact disk, why can't we store a man's intelligence and personality on one? So I have the engineers figuring that one out now… brain-mapping, artificial intelligence, we should've been working on it… 30 years ago. I will say this, and I'm going to say it on tape so that everybody hears it a hundred times a day; if I die before you people can pour me into a computer, I want Caroline to run this place. *Cough* *Cough*… now she'll argue… she'll say she can't… she's modest like that, but you make her! Hell, put her in my computer, I don't care…"_

~X~X~X~X~X~

"Caroline…"

"Yes… Mr. Johnson?" Caroline approached her boss, more hesitantly than she had ever before.

"I was talking to Dr. Morrison… he told me how close we are to the procedure… *Cough* *Cough* I won't be able to make it… I only have a couple weeks or so left… they won't be ready by then… I'll be gone… but you'll still be here." 

"Dr. Morrison…" Caroline repeated. Dr. Morrison was responsible for the advanced intelligence projects.

"Mr. Johnson… what are you…"

"Now I don't want you to worry, Caroline… Of all the people in the world that I'd want to run Aperture, there's no one who could do it as well as you…" 

"Sir, what do you mean?"

"Caroline, Dr. Morrison's been working tirelessly trying to perfect the extraction process… he's almost narrowed it down completely.

"Mr. Johnson…"

"Caroline, I don't want to argue about it! This is what's best for us, *Cough* best for the company, best for you." 

"No!"

"You'll be a bigger part of Aperture, it'll be managed *Cough* *Cough* far better than I ever did."

"But Mr. Johnson, I don't want to do this!" Caroline pleaded, holding her hands out to her superior in order to try to appeal to him.

"Caroline, it's already been decided!" Cave yelled, grabbing Caroline by the arms.

"Mr. Johnson! I don't want this!" Caroline weakly let out as a tear began to slide down her eye. Cave had never been so direct and forceful against Caroline's will, it was as if the last remnants of energy from his last days were being manifested in that one brief moment.

"Caroline, all that we've done, all that we've accomplished, all that Dr. Morrison's been through! It needs to come to a close… This needs to be done!"

"I'm not going to do it! I can't… be in some kind of thing!" Caroline screeched racing for the door, which to her surprise and horror, happened to be locked.

"Caroline!" Cave yelled back, struggling to reach Caroline through his wheelchair. "Morrison's experienced at the extraction process, he understands the dynamics better than anyone. I know you're not going to accept the position of CEO, but she will…"

"She?" Caroline repeated in disgust. "You mean GLaDOS?"

"GLaDOS is the culmination of everything I've- we've worked for, it's the final end result, the thing that will help us crush Black Mesa! Think about the possibilities of this! How far it will propel us forward into the future!"

Caroline still looked worried amidst the advances of her boss. "Mr. Johnson… I can't…" Frequent and horrible Images of brain manipulation processes and electrically induced shocks clouded her unsure mind.

"Caroline…" Cave demanded one last time, holding Caroline's shivering arms still. "You need to do this."

"I… I don't…"

"Caroline, listen to me…"

"Mr. Johnson… no…"

"It's for science…"

~X~X~X~X~X~

"Is it all good? Have you checked the systems?"

"They're fine… I've done this hundreds of times before… It's going to work out perfectly well." The man walked over towards an electronic panel which contained a number of old analog dials and advanced computational devices mixed in.

"How do you know? How can you be sure she won't turn out like… the others?"

"It's… now is different… we've learned a lot more, we've learned not to be so hasty, to use redundant systems, and make sure we have alternate plans for anything that could go wrong…"

"What about her?" What about Caroline?" One of the scientists asked, pointing outside of the large glass viewing platform. The woman was lying sedated and restrained on a nearby chair.

"As long as the backups are in place… He didn't mind what happened to her."

"So she's…"

"Yes, as far as we're concerned."

"Dr. Morrison… she'll still be in control of the facility? I don't see how that will be possible."

"It was Cave's final wish, don't you remember the messages? If he couldn't be loaded onto a computer, then she would. She won't control the facility right now, not like that. But we'll make sure that _she_ has no choice but to. We've already learned how to develop the itch… she'll naturally understand how to scratch it."

"But what about Mr. Johnson?"

"Mr. Johnson's dead, Dr. Shepherd… he couldn't care less about what happens now…"

"Don't you think there's going to be unintended consequences? What if when she wakes up, she tries to exact revenge, or what if we need to create something else to limit her power?"

"I've heard all of the arguments; I've considered them countless times. We'll have time to prepare, we'll be ok." Dr. Morrison said as he motioned for other scientists to enter the room below them. "We can begin now… we have nine hours…"

The scientists went to work conducting their myriad of duties, Dr. Morrison and Dr. Shepherd looked onward as they had many times before, only now it was different.

"It could take months to fully process the information… even then we won't have a successful method of mitigation."

"But you said that you'll take care of that…"

"I will… I'll find a way…"

The scientist moved over to a couple screens which resided on a shelf over to the side. "Her systems look normal… extraction seems be going along smoothly." He gave a thumbs up to those working below, speaking into nearby device which allowed him to communicate with them. "Keep it going down there, Halpert."

Dr. Shepherd peered outside of the ridged glass window in the observation room to see what the others were doing to Caroline. "I wonder what this means for Aperture… for us."

Dr. Morrison finished gathering the initial results from the monitoring station. He nodded contently as he approached Dr. Shepherd in an assured manner. "It means that she'll be in control of the facility… forever."

~X~X~X~X~X~

**The End**

Author's Notes: **Alright, confession time.**

**When I went into this story a long time ago, I was not sure of what to bring into it. Did I want to be funny, did I want to be dramatic, did I want to have insane moments where everything swings wildly from place to place… is it really going to have any romance? I think above all things I tried to be realistic… not that kind of realistic, though, I mean true to Aperture, and true to the characters, or at least a couple private representations of them. Truth is, at first, I had a lot of wild ambitions for this story; see, there was going to be this plot where a CIA agent is infiltrating Aperture, and there was going to be a Moon base, and there were going to be laser battles, and big "HE WAS AN ALIEN ALL ALONG" reveals and all that stuff. Ok, not really, but I definitely had the first two in mind at some point. **

**The reason I didn't go along with anything else is that I didn't want to detract from the history of Aperture, which I actually found to be the most integral part of the story… yeah, I know. But I sort of believed that the key to exploring Aperture's past was partially in the relationship between Cave & Caroline… does that make any sense? I think I might've had enough of these, because the real reason for me ending the story know is that frankly I don't know what else to do, except finally resolve it. Much of my effort was put into finding what could've fit in certain situations; I didn't have much room if you catch my drift. I guess that the complete conclusion to everything I've done the end can be summed up to… yeah I don't know.**

**So thanks again to all readers for your tireless efforts in doing practically nothing; yes, that means all ****12 ****13 of you.**


End file.
